News / Yemen

UN says $4.3bn needed to help war-ravaged Yemen as Saudi siege continues

Monday, 27 February 2023 10:25 AM [ Last Update: Monday, 27 February 2023 10:28 AM ]

Displaced Yemenis receive aid after their camps were exposed to heavy rain in the Khokha district of the country's western province of Hudaydah, on August 12, 2022. (Photo by AFP)

The United Nations says it needs $4.3 billion this year to help millions of people in war-wracked Yemen, warning that failure to deliver the aid will put them at risk amid the continued Saudi-led coalition’s siege.

The announcement from the world body came ahead of a donors’ conference on Monday as new assessments point to a rapidly worsening humanitarian situation in the Arab country.

Saudi Arabia and its allies launched the devastating war on Yemen in March 2015 with armed and logistical support from their Western partners, leaving hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead.

The war also displaced millions of people, rendering them homeless, while destroying the country’s infrastructure and spawning the contemporary age’s worst humanitarian catastrophe.

The most recent truce, which began in April 2022, had rekindled hopes of peace, but the Saudi-led coalition breached the terms of the ceasefire agreement, prompting Yemenis to continue resistance.

The world body in its appeal said aid agencies need the money to help more than 17 million people in the Arab country, which has been affected by the devastating eight-year war on the country.

The aid appeal from the United Nations comes as the Arab country is also teetering at the brink of the climate crisis, with severe drought and flooding threatening millions of lives, the UN said.

It acknowledged that “record global humanitarian needs are stretching donor support like never before.”

“But without sustained support for the aid operation in Yemen, the lives of millions of Yemenis will hang in the balance, and efforts to end the conflict once and for all will become even more challenging,” the world body said in a statement.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who will attend the donor conference in Geneva, said the international community had "the power and the means to end this crisis."

"And it begins by funding our appeal fully and committing to disbursing funds quickly," he said in a statement.

The devastating war has sought to re-impose the unpopular former Riyadh-friendly rulers on the country and crush the popular Ansarullah resistance movement.

The Saudi-led coalition and its Western backers, however, have failed to meet any of their objectives in the face of stiff and unflinching resistance by the Yemeni nation.

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