“The closer I got to my house, the faster my heart beats, the more my limbs tremble, and the saliva flows in my mouth,” Mr. M.H.D painfully reiterated. This man has just returned back after an absence of more than five years in a prison affiliated with the Saudi-led Coalition. He was detained by the Saudi-led Coalition of War on Yemen, when he was thirty years old, and his young son was ten years old then. He wonders how would be his son’s reaction to see his captive father in a shattered psychological state and a torn body as a result of the torture that was practiced on him daily with various forms of psychological and physical torture.
At last, M.H.D arrived home in a deplorable condition. He even had contours of aging skin on his face, and one of his legs was broken. He knocked on the door. … His wife opened the door to receive him along with the children. However, unfortunately, when they saw him, they were shocked and horror appeared on their faces. “Why you have become like this? What has happened to you?” they wondered silently. He also wandered “Why they received me with fear? What happened? I should have been received with great happiness and pleasure!”
M.H.D. has returned almost like a ghost. His appearance and features have changed dramatically and his face has wrinkled. He has become very thin, and gray hair fills his head. He silently entered his house, hesitantly headed to his room, and closed the door on himself. Then, silence and grief fell on the family. They gathered, and the children wondered what has happened to their father during the five years to become like this. He looks as if he were sixty years old.
After some time, he started to get recovered and mustered his energy to explain to them the types of inhuman treatment he received and the severe torture he was subject to daily in the detention centers and prisons. Every day that passed upon him in prison was as if it was a whole year.
Who will compensate this prisoner for this torment and loss? How would happiness find its way to his home, when he returned as a ghost, completely useless with neither capability to work, nor possibility to relieve his family of the heavy burdens of living. In fact, the negative impacts of incarceration have affected the life of the entire family.
Therefore, the international community must take its responsibility and seriously consider the prisoners’ file and its impacts on the parolees and their families. They must force the Coalition of War on Yemen, led by the US, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, to duly pay compensation to the prisoners and their families, so that they can re-build their normal life and overcome the bad impacts of incarceration.
