The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is taking action today against a key senior military official of Ansarallah, sometimes referred to as the Houthis, whose actions prolong Yemen’s civil war and exacerbate the country’s humanitarian crisis. Muhammad Abd Al-Karim al-Ghamari is responsible for orchestrating attacks by Houthi forces impacting Yemeni civilians. He has most recently taken charge of the large-scale Houthi offensive against Yemeni government-held territory in Marib province. As the Head of the General Staff of the Houthi armed forces, the most senior commander within the Houthi military leadership structure, Al-Ghamari is directly responsible for overseeing Houthi military operations that have destroyed civilian infrastructure and Yemen’s neighbors, specifically Saudi Arabia and the UAE. He directs the procurement and deployment of various weapons, including improvised explosive devices, ammunition, and UAVs. Al-Ghamari has also overseen Houthi UAV and missile attacks against Saudi Arabian targets. Al-Ghamari reportedly received his military training in Houthi militia camps run by Lebanese Hizballah and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Most recently, Al-Ghamari replaced Abdul Khaleq al Houthi, the brother of Houthi leader Abdul Malik al Houthi, as Commander in Chief of the Houthi offensive in Marib. The Marib offensive is a push by the Houthis to capture control of the province from Yemen’s internationally recognized government. Marib has served as a bastion of stability for millions of Yemenis, hosting camps for close to one million IDPs. The offensive has already forced tens of thousands of these IDPs to evacuate and threatens to displace hundreds of thousands more if it continues. The Houthi offensive on Marib has been brutal, with reports of Houthi ballistic missile attacks impacting IDP camps and other civilian sites in Marib. Al-Ghamari also participated in Houthi attacks on Saada in northwestern Yemen, and the 2014 capture of Yemen’s capital Sana’a. In 2015, he was appointed as head of the so-called Supreme Revolutionary Committee and Houthi supervisor in Hajjah governorate.
On November 9, 2012, OFAC issued the Yemen Sanctions Regulations, 31 CFR part 552 (the “Regulations”) (77 FR 67276, November 9, 2012), to implement Executive Order 13611 of May 16, 2012, “Blocking Property of Persons Threatening the Peace, Security, or Stability of Yemen” (77 FR 29533, May 18, 2012) (E.O. 13611). The Regulations were initially issued in abbreviated form for the purpose of providing immediate guidance to the public. OFAC is amending and reissuing the Regulations as a more comprehensive set of regulations that includes additional interpretive and definitional guidance, general licenses, statements of licensing policy, and other regulatory provisions that will provide further guidance to the public. Due to the number of regulatory sections being updated or added, OFAC is reissuing the Regulations in their entirety.
Executive Order 13611. On May 16, 2012, the President, invoking the authority of, inter alia, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701–1706) (IEEPA), issued E.O. 13611. In E.O. 13611, the President found that the actions and policies of certain members of the Government of Yemen and others threaten Yemen's peace, security, and stability, including by obstructing the implementation of the agreement of November 23, 2011, between the Government of Yemen and those in opposition to it, which provides for a peaceful transition of power that meets the legitimate demands and aspirations of the Yemeni people for change, and by obstructing the political process in Yemen. The President further found that these actions constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States and declared a national emergency to deal with that threat.
