The UN warned Friday that fighting in Yemen’s Hodeida province have targeted humanitarian workers and infrastructure, threatening its ability to feed 3.5 million “very hungry people.”

The World Food Program (WFP) said it was “extremely concerned about the series of security incidents in Hodeida city these past few days in and around deconflicted sites critical for the humanitarian response in Yemen”, describing the situation as “alarming”.

The UN agency warned that “the conflict (is) threatening the continuity of humanitarian assistance to the city and surrounding areas where needs are among the highest in the country.”

Alongside the threat of combat, civilians also face severe shortages of food, water and medicine in Hodeida province, according to the UN.

In August, WFP said it had provided emergency food assistance to some 700,000 of the around 900,000 people in the province considered to be at severe risk.

Agency spokesman Herve Verhoosel decried that a number of security incidences had been reported since Wednesday, including at the Red Sea Mill Silos, which mill a quarter of the agency’s monthly wheat requirements in Yemen.

“The ongoing clashes could jeopardize the shipments of 46,000 tons of wheat expected to arrive to Hodeida within the next ten days,” Verhoosel told reporters in Geneva.

Clashes near the mill “could impact our ability to feed up to 3.5 million very hungry people in northern and central Yemen for one month,” he warned.

Source: AFP