Fashion

Yemeni model in rebel jail attempts suicide


Dubai – A young Yemeni model has attempted suicide in a Sanaa jail run
by Huthi rebels enforcing a strict moral code, rights groups and her lawyer
said.

Entisar al-Hammadi, 19, was arrested on February 20 at a Sanaa
checkpoint while on her way to a photo shoot.

Huthi rebel forces who control the capital and much of northern Yemen
have
released no information on her case.

Hammadi, who is also an actress, was on Monday “transferred to a
hospital inside the central prison in Sanaa where she is being held after
attempting
suicide”, the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR) said in a statement.

Quoting press reports, the Lebanon-based group said Thursday: “A child
accompanying his imprisoned mother caught a glimpse of her face turning blue
after she tried to hang herself.

“He hurriedly told everyone, and she was rescued at the last moment but
was in critical condition.”

GCHR said “reliable sources” confirmed that she had tried to commit
suicide
“due to the decision of the central prison administration to transfer her to
the prison’s prostitution section”.

“This led to a severe deterioration in her psychological state.”

Her lawyer, Khaled al-Kamal, confirmed the details to AFP, saying she
was being targeted because of her profession as a model in an
ultraconservative
society.

According to Amnesty International, the model’s trial which opened on
June
6 had been tainted by “irregularities and abuse”.

Born to an Ethiopian mother and Yemeni father, Hammadi has posted dozens
of pictures online in traditional costume, jeans or leather jacket, some
with and some without an Islamic headscarf.

She has thousands of followers on Instagram and Facebook.

Upon her arrest, Hammadi was “interrogated while blindfolded, physically
and verbally abused, subjected to racist insults and forced to ‘confess’ to
several offences – including drug possession and prostitution”, Amnesty
said in May.

Violence against women, especially in Huthi-controlled areas, has been on
the increase since Yemen plunged into a civil war in 2014 that the United
Nations says has created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.(AFP)



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