Oxfam: Reopening Of Ports To Aid Only Is Pitiful Bartering With People’s Lives

Local Editor

In response to the Saudi Arabia-led coalition's announcement to reopen Hodeida port and Sana’a airport to humanitarian assistance, Oxfam said this is an empty gesture while millions of Yemenis sees their lives threatened by the two-week blockade on the country.

Shane Stevenson, Oxfam's Country Director in Yemen said: "Reopening the ports to aid but not to commercial imports is pitiful bartering with people's lives. We're facing the worst famine seen in decades, and that won’t change unless commercial shipments of food and fuel are allowed in. This brinksmanship has to stop. All sea and air ports must be fully reopened immediately to both humanitarian and commercial access to save millions of innocent Yemeni people."

Yemen’s defenseless people have been under massive attacks by the Saudi-led coalition for more than two and half years but Riyadh has reached none of its objectives in Yemen so far.

Since March 2015, Saudi Arabia and some of its Arab allies have been carrying out deadly airstrikes against the Houthi Ansarullah movement in an attempt to restore power to fugitive former president Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.

Over 12,000 Yemenis, including thousands of women and children, have lost their lives in the deadly military campaign.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by Website Team