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.
Source: Agencies (editted by Al-Manar English Website)
