Yemen’s country-code domain .YE is delegated to TeleYemen (IANA root-zone). Since the Houthi takeover of Sana’a, that infrastructure has been under militia control. The .YE namespace is used to project false legitimacy, run propaganda, censor the Internet, and surveil Yemenis. Independent journalists have been kidnapped, disappeared, and killed; UN and NGO staff have been detained. A country’s domain should serve its people, not a militia.

This is digital state capture. All .gov.ye and .edu.ye are operated under militia authority, while the internationally recognized government and civil society are forced onto .com/.net. .YE no longer serves its local Internet community.

We call on ICANN and IANA to act within their mandate:

1) Review the delegation of .YE based on failure to serve the local community.
2) Redelegate .YE to a neutral trustee until representative governance is restored.
3) Protect users by refusing to legitimize a ccTLD run by a militia that targets press and civil society.

Why this matters: Allowing an armed group to control a national TLD normalizes digital state capture and undermines trust in the global DNS. There is precedent for redelegation after state collapse (.SO, Somalia). Silence on .YE creates a double standard: ICANN would not allow a militia to run .fr or .uk.

Key facts:
• .YE manager is TeleYemen (IANA record).
• Houthi control of telecoms enables surveillance and filtering.
• Propaganda fronts operate on .YE (e.g., saba.ye; military media mmy.ye).
• Journalists have been abducted or killed; UN/NGO detentions documented.
• Legitimate institutions and civil society are excluded from .YE.

We ask ICANN and IANA to uphold core principles: a ccTLD must serve its local Internet community. Redelegate .YE and return Yemen’s digital identity to its people.