A damning new report by the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) and the Abductees Mothers Association (AMA) exposes a secret detention center in Aden operated by the Southern authorities in Yemen. Known as the Waddah Hall and once a civic center, the facility is part of a wider network of clandestine prisons that has proliferated across Yemen, sites whose existence officials have long denied and only recently begun to acknowledge. This acknowledgment comes in the wake of a rift between the Southern Transitional Council (STC) and the Internationally Recognized Government (IRG), after STC forces attempted to expand control over southern cities in December 2025, prompting Saudi airstrikes and conflicting claims of the Council’s dissolution.
The report that is based on thirty interviews and documents at least eighteen cases of enforced disappearance, some of them dating back to 2016. Widespread patterns of arbitrary arrest, torture, and denial of medical care in Waddah Hall are also exposed by the report.
Families consistently described masked armed men abducting relatives without warrants, and when they sought information, they were threatened. Released detainees recount suspension, electrocution, suffocation, and coerced confessions. Families also describe how forced confessions, sometimes filmed, were used to justify continued detention or enable transfers to other facilities. Conditions inside Waddah Hall and related sites, as reported by families, include solitary confinement in cramped, windowless and unsanitary spaces, insufficient food and water, and systematic obstruction of medical treatment, contributing to severe deterioration in detainees’ health.
“Secret detention facilities like Waddah Hall have not only inflicted immense suffering on detainees and their families but have also entrenched parallel systems of authority that deepen Yemen’s divisions,” said Amna Guellali, CIHRS Research Director. “By fostering abuses and bypassing judicial institutions, these practices have fractured communities and undermined prospects for reconciliation. Their legacy continues to fuel fragmentation today, threatening to push Yemen into even greater disunity if accountability and justice are not urgently pursued.”
Waddah Hall, located in the Gold Moor area of Al‑Tawahi District in Aden Governorate, sits within the Counter‑Terrorism Camp and in close proximity to the STC security headquarters. The facility is run by security units backed, trained, and financed by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), under the banner of counterterrorism, and operate in large part through the STC. The UAE’s sponsorship embedded a parallel system of repression beyond judicial oversight, while the STC’s role in administering these forces further fractured Yemen’s institutions. In Aden and other southern cities, this dynamic has created overlapping centers of power, with STC aligned forces asserting control against the IRG, each backed by rival foreign patrons. These competing authorities have not only undermined judicial institutions but have also entrenched polarization and instability, leaving communities caught between fragmented loyalties and unchecked repression.
Nevertheless, secret detention is not the responsibility of one party alone. Abuses of this kind have been documented across areas controlled by different actors, including forces affiliated with the IRG. Addressing secret detention must not become selective or politicized.
The recent conflict that erupted in December 2025 between the STC (backed by the United Arab Emirates) and the IRG (supported by Saudi Arabia) exposed deep fractures within Yemen’s anti-Houthi camp. Armed confrontations, political infighting, and competing claims to authority in southern areas have fueled renewed instability and drawn regional backers more directly into the dispute. In this volatile context, revelations about secret detention sites risk being instrumentalized by rival parties to discredit one another rather than to deliver justice. Regardless of these power struggles, the rights of detainees and the demands of families for truth, accountability, and reparation must remain the central priority. In this context, President Rashad Al Alimi, Chairman of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council since April 2022, announced in January 2026 the closure of all unofficial and secret prisons across southern Yemen. It must be implemented transparently with immediate effect, and accompanied by credible investigations, disclosure of detainees’ whereabouts, and accountability for perpetrators regardless of affiliation. Families of the disappeared must not be left caught between rival authorities. Their rights to truth, justice, and reparation must come first.
CIHRS and AMA call on authorities to close Waddah Hall and other secret facilities, ensure detainees are either released or brought before independent courts, and guarantee immediate access to medical care and legal representation. Reparations must be provided to victims and their families, while independent monitors and UN bodies must be granted unhindered access to all detention sites.
The international community, and particularly the United Nations Human Rights Council, must re‑establish independent investigations, preserve evidence, and ensure that perpetrators are held accountable. Victims and their families cannot be denied truth, justice, and reparations any longer.
“Waddah Hall represents more than a location where abuse occurred; it stands as a poignant symbol of how Yemen’s war and foreign interventions have fostered lasting systems of repression. Confronting its legacy is vital for rebuilding trust, securing accountability, and safeguarding the rights of detainees and their families” said Amat Al Salam, AMA’s President.