Local Editor
NGOs have urged world powers for an immediate attention required to end the world’s most humanitarian crises. Yemen is regarded as an invisible conflict that the world has forgotten. Nearly 50,000 children have died needlessly with a debilitate blockade on ports and airports compounding food shortages and a cholera outbreak affecting nearly one million people.
The situation is getting severe by the day, after a missile attack on Riyadh in November has aggravated disease which was already rampant in Yemen by creating a dire vaccine shortage. In a country which was highly dependent on food imports even before the war, French aid group ACTED estimates that some 22 million Yemenis, three quarters of the population now rely on aid to survive.
On her recent visit, a senior adviser at Save the Children Caroline Anning said, “There are things that could happen tomorrow that could stop children from dying. Considering the depth of the suffering and the fact that it’s entirely man-made, we haven’t had the level of international attention on Yemen that you would expect to see”
According to the letter published in France’s Le Monde daily, “The conflict “has transformed the poorest country in the Middle East into the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The letter calls on US President Donald Trump, his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron and British premier Theresa May, to push for an immediate ceasefire and peace talks as permanent members of the UN Security Council.”
The letter signed by stars including actors Bill Nighy and Juliette Binoche said, “Millions of Yemeni women, men and children feel abandoned by world leaders, who seem to place profits and politics before human lives.”
ACTED’s Yemen country Director Liny Suharlim, said “Lifting the blockade should be an immediate priority. But only a political settlement will end the suffering of civilians who have borne the brunt of the crisis. We are there doing what we call firefighting. For us it’s really disheartening because this is something that is entirely preventable, completely man-made.”
Further she added, “The fact that the war has not sparked a significant refugee crisis – a combined result of poverty, geography and Yemenis’ inability to escape the relentless fighting has also encouraged the West to ignore the conflict. For all of the suffering with the extreme rates of acute malnutrition, the number of children dying every day, the world’s biggest cholera outbreak or from hunger, it’s contained within Yemen’s borders.”
Some aid supplies have been allowed in, but the blockade has had knock-on effects including soaring fuel prices which are crippling everything from hospitals to water plants. Under a newly launched online campaign called ‘Yemen Can’t Wait’, some 350 public figures have signed an open letter urging the United States, Britain and France to do more to end a war that has claimed more than 12,000 lives.
Source: News Agencies, Edited by Website Team
