The Houthis released a senior government army commander on Monday, five years after kidnapping him from his workplace in the coastal city of Hodeidah in western Yemen.

Brig. Gen. Khalid Abdullah Khalil, former head of operations in the army’s Fifth Military Region, was released after mediation efforts by his former colleague, Brig. Gen. Abu Alaa Al-Qadiri, who now works for the Houthis, sources close to Khalil’s family told Almasdar Online. 

The Houthis released Khalil on condition that he stays in Sana’a and will not travel elsewhere, his relatives said. Khalil founded the Tihama movement, a political organization addressing the grievances of residents of the Tihama region along Yemen's Red Sea coast.