Houthis Accuse France of Having Links to Deadly Market Attack in Northwestern Yemen

“The French actions left people dead and injured as a result of the artillery bombardment of the Al-Raqu market in the border administrative region of Munabih in the province of Saada. The use of French weapons and experience in the aggression is a crime, which is ignored by the French justice system in return for arms deals”, Mohammed Ali Al-Houthi, member of the Supreme Political Council of the Houthi movement, wrote on his Twitter page on late Wednesday.

On Tuesday, the Houthi-controlled media reported that at least 17 people had been killed as a result of the Saudi army’s shelling of a market in the Yemeni northwestern province of Saada.

In spring, French media reported that parties to the Yemeni conflict were using the weapons, produced in the European country. The reports emerged several months after French Minister for the Armed Forces Florence Parly told the France Inter broadcaster that she was not aware of any French weapons being used directly in Yemen.

Yemen has been engulfed in an armed conflict between the government forces led by President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and the Shiite Houthi movement, also known as Ansar Allah, backed by army units loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, for several years. The Saudi-led coalition has been carrying out airstrikes against the Houthis at Hadi's request since March 2015. Despite the peace accord, signed in Stockholm in 2018, the tensions have significantly escalated in recent months.