(Thursday, July 25, 2013)

 

Prominent Yemeni journalist Abdulelah Haider Shaye has been released from prison after being held for three years on terrorism-related charges at the request of President Obama.

 

Shaye helped expose the U.S. cruise missile attack on the Yemeni village of al-Majalah that killed 41 people, including 14 women and 21 children in December 2009. Then-Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh announced his intention to pardon Shaye in 2011, but apparently changed his mind after a phone call from Obama. In a statement, the White House now says it is «concerned and disappointed» by Shaye’s release.

 

«We should let that statement set in: The White House is saying that they are disappointed and concerned that a Yemeni journalist has been released from a Yemeni prison,» says Jeremy Scahill, national security correspondent for The Nation, who covers Shaye’s case in «Dirty Wars,» his new book and film by the same name.

 

«This is a man who was put in prison because he had the audacity to expose a U.S. cruise missile attack that killed three dozen women and children.» We’re also joined by Rooj Alwazir, a Yemeni-American activist who co-founded the Support Yemen media collective and campaigned for Shaye’s release.

 

 

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