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Qatar Press Center Calls for Urgent Action to Protect Yemen's Journalists

The Qatar Press Center condemns, in the strongest terms, the increasing risks faced by journalists and media workers in Yemen, and the resulting displacement of 117 journalists, media professionals, and workers in media institutions from the city of Mocha and surrounding areas during this current September, against the backdrop of recent military developments and the Houthi group's entry into the region, amid escalating fears for their safety, freedoms, properties, and professional equipment.

The Center acknowledges reports issued by Yemeni and international media and human rights organizations, most notably the Media Freedom Observatory in Yemen, which reported that a number of journalists left their homes urgently, amid fears of being arrested or detained due to their media work, while others left without being able to move their personal belongings or professional equipment.

The Center expresses its grave concern over the information reported by the Observatory regarding the storming of journalists' homes and the looting of their contents, emphasizing that targeting journalists, threatening them, or forcing them to displace due to their profession constitutes a serious violation of press freedom and the public's right to access information.

The Center reiterates its demand to all parties and authorities in Yemen to commit to protecting journalists and media workers, to stop any practices targeting them due to their work, to release those detained, to reveal the fate of those disappeared, and to ensure that those responsible for attacks and violations do not escape accountability.

The Center calls on international and regional organizations concerned with press freedom and human rights to intensify their efforts to provide protection and support to displaced journalists, and to assist them in restoring their work tools and securing their basic needs, enabling them to continue performing their professional mission.

The Center affirms that protecting journalists and media workers in conflict zones is a responsibility that requires respecting the rules of international humanitarian law, ensuring their safety and not targeting or detaining them due to their journalistic work, in addition to protecting their headquarters, equipment, and properties, and enabling them to perform their professional duty without threat or intimidation.

The Center warns that the displacement of journalists from tension areas not only affects their humanitarian and professional conditions, but also weakens the media's ability to convey independent field information, and increases the difficulty of verifying news and developments in conflict zones, paving the way for rumors, unreliable information, and multiple conflicting narratives.

This comes amid a highly dangerous media environment in Yemen, where the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate documented 127 violations of media freedoms during 2025, including cases of detention, trials, assaults, threats, and prevention of coverage, in addition to the killing of 16 journalists and media workers during the same year.

The Media Freedom Observatory in Yemen documented more than 100 violation incidents during 2025, including 15 killings and 30 cases of arrest and arbitrary detention, in addition to cases of threat, prosecution, and prevention of coverage.

The Qatar Press Center reiterates its affirmation that the protection of journalists is not a luxury or merely a professional demand, but a necessity to ensure societies' right to know, preserve the flow of independent information, and enhance opportunities for professional documentation of violations and developments in conflict zones.