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Incident on 29 January 2016 [+] Print this page

Location: Al-Shihab Industrial Compound, At Tahrir District, Amanat Al Asimah [+]

Country: Yemen [+]

Violation types: Unlawful Airstrike [+]

Location


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This incident took place in Al-Shihab Industrial Compound, At Tahrir District, Amanat Al Asimah, Yemen [+]

Description


According to Human Rights Watch: "At about 9 p.m. on January 29, 2016 an airstrike hit al-Shihab Industrial Complex, located in the northern part of Sanaa city. The bombs struck outside a storage hangar for tea and rice. A second strike hit just outside the factory compound. No one was injured in this attack. On January 30 beginning at about 2 p.m., four additional strikes hit the factory, wounding two guards and another employee and killing a third guard. These strikes hit the storage hangar for Nido fortified milk powder, the tea and rice storage hangar (for the second time), an office building that housed company records, and a hangar where the factory produced deodorant. In total, five strikes hit the factory over two days. Abdullah Hamood Qaid al-Ali, 29, a guard at factory, told Human Rights Watch that he was at the factory for both sets of strikes. He said that on the evening of January 29, “I was at the gate when the first airstrike hit here. The fire truck came to put out the fire. The second airstrike hit after that, but it struck outside [the factory] and nothing happened.” He said that the next afternoon, “I was at the gate, stopping the people who wanted to come to loot things from the factory. I heard the sound of the bomb before the aircraft…. We heard the aircraft sounds only after.” He added that the hangars hit contained a variety of food and other dry products and repeated that the factory stored no weapons. The nearest Houthi checkpoint was 1.5 kilometers away, he said. Human Rights Watch examined the site on March 21, 2016 and found no evidence the factory had been used for military purposes. The airstrikes had completely destroyed the hangers by collapsing the structures and ripping off the zinc roofing of the attack on the Nido milk powder hangar left a deep crater in the floor. All heavy steel machinery was destroyed, as well as all of the finished products that were being stored. The remains of at least eight damaged or destroyed vehicles remained in the yard. According to one of the security guards at the factory, the factory had employed about 150 workers, including 50 to 60 women. The Shihab company, which owns the compound, imports a variety of products to Yemen including Nido fortified milk powder, Quaker Oats, and Nestle products. According to Akil Omar Shihab, the chief executive officer of the Shihab company, the company provides 70 percent of the baby food supply in Yemen. The factory also produces consumer goods including facial tissue, tea, and deodorant. Shihab said that the attacks particularly surprised him in light of a Houthi-led boycott campaign against products manufactured and imported by his company. He shared with Human Rights Watch an Arabic-language Facebook site advocating for a boycott against American and Israeli goods, which included Houthi logos and links to Houthi-affiliated media sources, as well as the commercial logos of Nestle and other companies. The Shihab company imports Nestle products. The page had not been active for several months before the war began. The attack on the compound was unlawful unless the factory was being used for military purposes, including to produce or store goods intended for military use. Human Rights Watch found no evidence of such goods when researchers visited." [+]

Perpetrator units

Name Other Names Classification
Operation Restoring Hope [+] Arab Coalition
Arab Coalition Forces
Arab Coalition to restore legitimacy in Yemen
Gulf Arab coalition
Hope Restoration Operation
Joint Forces
Operation Renewal of Hope
Operation Storm of Resolve
Saudi-led Arab Coalition
Saudi-led Coalition
coalition forces
operations Renewal of Hope
Air Force [+]
Army [+]
Joint Operation [+]
Military [+]
Navy [+]

Sources

List of all sources used to evidence the data in this record Click the "+" symbol next to every data point in the record to see the sources used for that data point.

Publication Date Publisher Publication Title Access Date Archive Link
11 July 2016 Human Rights Watch Bombing Businesses: Saudi Coalition Airstrikes on Yemen’s Civilian Economic Structures 22 November 2019