UN warns of worsening humanitarian situation in Yemen
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UN humanitarian coordinator for Yemen David Gressly warned of the acute hunger and malnutrition in Yemen, calling for urgent assistance for a population whose numbers in need increased by almost three million from 2021.
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A displaced woman sits among her children outside a temporary shelter in Sanaa, Yemen, 7 February 2020 (Yahiya Arhab/EPA/EFE)
While the United Nations warned of worsening humanitarian conditions in Yemen, it noted that the fragile two-month truce that came into effect in early April could contribute to changing the situation.
"The worsening humanitarian crisis in Yemen is a reality that we need to urgently address," David Gressly, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Yemen said in a statement released on Saturday, adding that "Over 23 million people -- or almost three-quarters of Yemen's population -- now need assistance... an increase of almost three million people from 2021."
Gressly urged donors to benefit from the UN-brokered truce that has come into effect on April 2, considering the truce as "a vital opportunity for aid agencies to scale up life-saving assistance and to reach more people in acute need quickly, including in areas where access was limited due to armed conflict and insecurity."
"For aid agencies to immediately step up efforts, we count on sufficient donor funding. Otherwise, the aid operation will collapse despite the positive momentum we are seeing in Yemen today," he warned.
Talking about the 2022 humanitarian response plan for Yemen, he said the UN needs around $4.3 "to reverse a steady deterioration of the humanitarian situation."
The plan targets 17.3 million people, he added, and nearly 13 million people "are already facing acute levels of need".
For the past seven years, Yemen has been enduring aggression by the Saudi-led coalition that daily butchers civilians, destroys civilian infrastructure and residential areas, and starves innocent Yemenis - all amid international silence and complicity, and support from the US and several Western states.
More than half of Yemen’s people face acute hunger, with half of the children under five being at risk of malnutrition.
UN-brokered humanitarian truce breached
On Saturday, a military official revealed to Saba news agency that the Saudi-led coalition and its mercenaries committed 124 breaches of the UN-brokered humanitarian and military truce in Yemen in the past 24 hours.
The coalition made 35 overflights with armed and reconnaissance drones in the airspaces of Marib, Hajjah, Jawf, Saada, and Taiz provinces.
The source confirmed that the Saudi-led coalition mercenaries established combat fortifications west of the Haradh area in Hajjah Province.
Saba cited the military official as saying, "12 violations were recorded by artillery shelling on citizens' homes and on the sites of the Army and Popular Committees in the village of Al-Zour and in Rawdat Sarwah in Marib Governorate, as well as on their sites in Al-Madafen and Al-Malahith areas in Saada Province and Al-Fakher area in Dhalea Province."
In addition, the official indicated that the coalition committed 76 violations by firing bullets at citizens' homes and at the Yemeni Armed Forces and Popular Committees sites in Marib, Saada, Taiz, Hajjah, and Dhalea provinces.
Since day one following its pledge to abide by the UN-brokered truce, the Saudi army has been violating the armistice despite international mediation, killing Wednesday two Yemeni citizens in Saada, northern Yemen.
