US will return Houthi militia to terrorism list
Raises concerns about aid for Yemen’s civilians
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration will designate Yemen’s Houthi militia as a terrorist organization, partly reimposing penalties it lifted nearly three years ago on the Iran-backed group whose attacks on regional shipping traffic have drawn a US military response.
Beginning in mid-February, the United States will consider the Houthis a “specially designated global terrorist” group, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement Wednesday, blocking its access to the global financial system, among other penalties. But Biden officials stopped short of applying a second, more severe designation — that of “foreign terrorist organization” — which the Trump administration imposed on the Houthis in its final days. The State Department revoked both designations shortly after President Biden took office in early 2021.
That further step would have made it far easier to prosecute criminally anyone who knowingly provides the Houthis with money, supplies, training, or other “material support.” But aid groups are already warning that it could also impede humanitarian assistance to Yemen.
The move comes as a response to, and an effort to halt, weeks of Houthi missile and drone attacks on maritime traffic off Yemen’s coast. Those attacks, which the group describes as a show of solidarity with Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in the Gaza Strip, have forced some major shipping companies to reroute their vessels, leading to delays and higher shipping costs worldwide. After issuing multiple warnings to the Houthis, Biden ordered dozens of strikes on their facilities in Yemen, although US officials say the group retains most of its ability to attack commerce in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
But the designation also reflects an effort to strike a balance, one that protects the flow of desperately needed humanitarian aid to the people of Yemen, who have endured famine, disease, and displacement through more than a decade of civil war after the Houthis seized the country’s capital in September 2014.
David Schenker, a former assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs in the Trump administration, said the Biden administration had chosen to “split the difference.”
“I think they were trying to find a half-measure that would reflect their frustration with the Houthis while trying to minimize the potential risk of further humanitarian hardship,” he said.
US officials worry that branding the Houthis a foreign terrorist organization could cause aid groups to stop sending supplies into Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, for fear it could be deemed “material support” subject to criminal liability.
Biden has been contemplating the move for at least two years, telling reporters in January 2022 that restoring the Houthis’ terrorist designation was “under consideration” after the group conducted a lethal cross-border strike on the United Arab Emirates.
Asked by a reporter last week whether he considered the Houthis a terrorist group, Biden did not equivocate. “I think they are,” he replied.