Local Editor
With ongoing violence and peace talks on fragile ground, Yemen’s population faces a new threat: the World Food Program has warned that a funding shortfall may soon force it to halt operations in the country.
"We are on the edge," WFP’s country director in Yemen, Purnima Kashyap, told IRIN. "By July we will have no resources available and will not be able to deliver [food] starting in August."
After thirteen months of fighting between the Houthi Ansarullah revolutionaries and a Saudi Arabia-led coalition that has left more than 6,400 dead, this would be a major blow to a population already deep in the throes of a humanitarian crisis.
At last count in October 2015, 14.4 million Yemenis out of a population of 26 million were considered "food insecure," including 7.6 million "severely insecure": they don’t know where their next meal will come from.
At the moment, Kashyap explained, WFP is only able to provide food or food vouchers to a fraction of those who need it - 3.59 million in March. If the funding runs out, "even they will be without food," she said.
Even if the WFP were at full funding, Kashyap said, it is "still only able to fill in the gaps."
Source: News Agencies, Edited by Website Team
