On Monday, the Canadian government announced the addition of the extremist Houthi group to its list of terrorist entities.
The Iran-backed group, officially known as Ansar Allah, has operated in Yemen since the early 2000s and has contributed to unrest in the Middle East by attacking numerous commercial and naval ships in the Red Sea for more than a year.
Those attacks began in November 2023 in protest of the Israeli military attack on Gaza following the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas, also backed by Iran.
Canada supported British and American strikes against Houthi targets earlier this year in response to the Red Sea attacks.
“Today’s addition of Ansar Allah to the list of terrorist entities contributes to our efforts to combat terrorism globally and aligns Canada with our allies,” Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc said in a statement.
“Acts of violent extremism and terrorism have no place in the world and we will continue to take action to limit the spread of these activities internationally and to address the threats facing Canada, its citizens and its interests around the world.”
Under Canadian law, this designation allows for criminal penalties to be imposed on any person or group that knowingly engages with a listed entity. Anyone found to be a member of a listed entity can be banned from entering Canada.
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The order acknowledges that the term “Houthi” can also refer to an ethnic group in Yemen, and this label only applies to Ansar Allah fighters.
The conservatives called on the government to list the Houthis as a terrorist entity in October.
The Houthis also worked closely with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Lebanese Hezbollah, both of which are also listed as terrorist entities in Canada.
More recently, the Houthis have directly targeted Israel with missile attacks while intensifying their strikes in the Red Sea as the conflict in the Middle East expands to include Hezbollah and Iran. The movement pledged to continue its attacks until Israel withdraws its military forces from Gaza.
The United States included Ansar Allah on the list of terrorist groups in January this year.
The Houthis control much of northern Yemen and have been fighting for control of the country with the internationally recognized Yemeni government since 2014. The civil war is one of the bloodiest in modern history, with more than 150,000 people killed and another 227,000 killed by famine and other causes. . Indirect causes, according to United Nations estimates.
– With files from The Canadian Press
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