We do not ask you to trust us
Many publications about Yemen are funded by governments or parties to the war. Every one of them says it tells the truth. This record makes no such claim about itself. It shows its evidence, names its sources, and invites you to check them.
1Every claim has a source
Nothing is stated as fact without a published, checkable source. Each claim is marked as documented, testimony, or allegation. Where sources disagree, both are shown, along with what each one says.
2Every party, one standard
This record documents the Houthi movement in depth, because it is the subject. It applies the same standard of evidence to every other party: the Saudi-led coalition, the United Arab Emirates, the Yemeni government, the Southern Transitional Council, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, and foreign states that have carried out strikes. A civilian killed by an airstrike is recorded as carefully as a civilian killed by a landmine.
3Independence and funding
The record accepts no money from any government, political party, armed group, or organisation with a stake in the war. All funding is listed publicly, with amounts. If that ever changes, this page will say so before any money is accepted.
4No source is above question
UN agencies, human rights groups, research centres and news outlets are cited when their evidence holds. None is treated as beyond question. A sources register lists the major sources this record relies on, who publishes and funds them, and where their past reporting has been corrected or disputed.
5Their own words
The movement’s founding texts, speeches and decrees are published in full, in Arabic and in translation. Quotations are never cut in a way that changes their meaning, and the full text is always one click away.
6What we do not publish
Unverified rumours. Information that could identify or endanger private people, witnesses or victims. Graphic images, unless they are the evidence and no description will do. Claims we cannot support, however strongly we believe them.
7Right of reply
Any person or organisation named in a serious allegation is offered the chance to respond before publication. Their response, or the fact that they declined, is published alongside.
8Corrections
Mistakes are corrected openly. The corrections log records the date, the original text, and the change. Corrections are never made silently.
9Why the editors are anonymous
The people who write this record have lived through the events it describes. Critics of the parties to this war have been detained, threatened and killed, so the editors do not publish their names. That is one more reason the record rests on evidence rather than on anyone’s authority.