Yemen Donor Conference Seeks Billions to Prevent Famine
SANA’A (Dispatches) – The United Nations says it hopes to raise $3.85bn to prevent large-scale famine in Yemen, warning that life in the war-ravaged nation was unbearable, with children enduring a "special kind of hell”.
More than 100 governments and donors took part in a virtual donor conference on Monday – co-hosted by Sweden and Switzerland – as Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah fighters push to liberate former Saudi-backed president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s last northern stronghold of Marib.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed and millions pushed to the brink of famine since a Saudi-led coalition launched a devastating war in March 2015 in support of Hadi’s regime.
But with aid funding dropping in 2020 amid the coronavirus downturn, resulting in the closure of many humanitarian programs, the situation in the country has become even worse.
The UN, which has described the situation in Yemen as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, and its partners received $1.9bn last year – about half of what was required.
It called on Monday for "immediate funding” to support 16 million people in Yemen, where some two-thirds of the population is in need of some form of aid to survive.
"For most people, life in Yemen is now unbearable. Childhood in Yemen is a special kind of hell. This war is swallowing up a whole generation of Yemenis,” said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
"We must end it now and start dealing with its enormous consequences immediately. This is not the moment to step back from Yemen,” he said in a statement.
Four United Nations agencies earlier this month warned that nearly 2.3 million children under the age of five were projected to suffer from acute malnutrition this year in war-torn Yemen.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO) in a joint statement on February 12 said that of the overall figure, about 400,000 children were expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition and could die if they did not receive urgent treatment.
More than 100 governments and donors took part in a virtual donor conference on Monday – co-hosted by Sweden and Switzerland – as Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah fighters push to liberate former Saudi-backed president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s last northern stronghold of Marib.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed and millions pushed to the brink of famine since a Saudi-led coalition launched a devastating war in March 2015 in support of Hadi’s regime.
But with aid funding dropping in 2020 amid the coronavirus downturn, resulting in the closure of many humanitarian programs, the situation in the country has become even worse.
The UN, which has described the situation in Yemen as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, and its partners received $1.9bn last year – about half of what was required.
It called on Monday for "immediate funding” to support 16 million people in Yemen, where some two-thirds of the population is in need of some form of aid to survive.
"For most people, life in Yemen is now unbearable. Childhood in Yemen is a special kind of hell. This war is swallowing up a whole generation of Yemenis,” said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
"We must end it now and start dealing with its enormous consequences immediately. This is not the moment to step back from Yemen,” he said in a statement.
Four United Nations agencies earlier this month warned that nearly 2.3 million children under the age of five were projected to suffer from acute malnutrition this year in war-torn Yemen.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO) in a joint statement on February 12 said that of the overall figure, about 400,000 children were expected to suffer from severe acute malnutrition and could die if they did not receive urgent treatment.