During a
briefing last Friday, the UN warned that millions more Yemeni
civilians are expected to starve to death before year’s end as a
result of a blockade imposed on the country by the Saudi Arabia-led
coalition. The Saudis’ unsuccessful bid to quash the Houthi-led
resistance movement against Western and Saudi imperialism in Yemen
has already claimed the lives of thousands of civilians and
transformed the country into the world’s worst humanitarian crisis
since the war began in 2015.
Mark
Lowcock, the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, expressed his
concern regarding the “recent decline of commercial food imports
through the Red Sea ports” — adding that, if conditions do
not improve, the number of Yemenis at the brink of starvation would
rise from the current figure of 8.4 million to 18.4 million by this
December. Given that there are approximately 28 million people in
Yemen, a continuation of the Saudi-led blockade would mean that
nearly two-thirds of the entire country’s population will soon face
starvation.
The
U.N.’s warning of a growing famine in Yemen comes during the holy
month of Ramadan, when the first revelation of the Quran is
celebrated by Muslims through fasting. Given the number of Yemenis
facing starvation, many Yemeni Muslims will be without food to break
their fast.
While
the coalition — composed of Saudi Arabia and the UAE, with support
from other Gulf monarchies and Western governments — has publicly
claimed that it has lifted the blockade after international pressure,
the coalition’s “ship inspections” continue to prevent critical
supplies – such as food, fuel and medicine – from entering the
most populated portions of the country, which remain under Houthi
control.
Lowcock
stated that the “lifting” of the blockade has had little impact
on the crisis, noting that imports are “well short of
pre-blockade averages” and are insufficient to prevent the mass
starvation of Yemeni civilians. In addition, the blockade has
prevented sufficient medicine from entering the country — allowing
the worst cholera epidemic in recent history to ravage Yemen, even
though cholera is easily treated with inexpensive medication.
The UN’s
dire warning regarding the situation in Yemen, undoubtedly the worst
humanitarian crisis in the world, comes just as the Saudi-led
coalition, with support from the United States and the United
Kingdom, is preparing for an assault on the key Yemeni port of
Hodeidah. On Monday, a coalition spokesman announced that its forces
were within 20 km from the Houthi-held port, which has long been a
key coalition target. The UN and other groups have long warned that
any assault on Hodeidah would drastically worsen the crisis and
greatly increase the number of Yemenis facing starvation.
Full
report:
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