Local Editor
French President Emmanuel Macron called for a "complete lifting" of a blockade on Yemen in a telephone call with Saudi Arabia's King Salman on Dec. 24, an Elysee source said on Wednesday.
"The president expressed his strong concerns about the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen and called on the Saudi king to lift completely the blockade to allow humanitarian aid and commercial goods to enter Yemen," the source said.
The Saudi-led coalition bombing Yemen said that it would keep the Houthi-controlled Hodeida port - vital for aid - open for a month. However, sources in the war-torn country denied the Saudi announcement.
Saudi Arabia has been leading a destructive military campaign against Yemen since March 2015 to reinstate former president Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi and crush the Houthi movement.
The campaign has seriously damaged the country’s infrastructure. In its tallies released in February, Yemen’s Legal Center for Rights and Development said the Saudi war had killed over 12,000 civilians, including 2,568 kids.
Source: News Agencies, Edited by Website Team
