DUBAI (Dispatches) – The United Nations says it is seeking nearly $80 million for an emergency operation to prevent a catastrophic oil spill in the Red Sea off Yemen.
The 45-year-old tanker FSO Safer, long used as a floating oil storage platform with 1.1 million barrels of crude on board, has been moored off the Yemeni port of Hudaydah since 2015, without being serviced.
“The Safer is at imminent risk of a major spill, which would create a humanitarian and ecological catastrophe centered on a country already decimated by more than seven years of war,” the United Nations said in a statement.
“International support — including funding — is needed now to implement the UN-coordinated plan to address the threat before it is too late.”
The UN said that the emergency part of the two-stage operation would see the toxic cargo pumped from the storage platform to a temporary replacement vessel at a cost of $79.6 million.
In the second phase, a replacement platform would be installed at a cost to be finalized over the coming week.
“Implementation of the plan cannot begin without donor funding,” the UN said, adding that the Netherlands will host a donor meeting.
It said “rapid donor commitments of funds” were needed to begin work by the second half of May.
“Waiting beyond then could mean delaying the start of the project by several months, leaving the timebomb ticking.”
Saudi Arabia-led coalition launched the devastating war on Yemen in March 2015 in collaboration with its Arab allies and with arms and logistics support from the U.S. and other Western states.
The objective was to reinstall the unpopular, West-friendly regime of Hadi and crush the popular Ansarullah resistance movement, which has been running state affairs in the absence of a functional government in Yemen.
The foreign aggressors have failed to meet their goals, despite killing hundreds of thousands of Yemeni civilians and spawning what has been described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
A high-ranking Yemeni official says the Saudi-led coalition has failed to adhere to the terms of the UN-brokered two-month truce, accusing the Riyadh regime and its allied militants of breaching the deal.
Yemen’s Deputy Foreign Minister Hussein al-Ezzi in a Twitter post on Friday evening said that violations of the truce by the Saudi-led side were on the rise, the latest being a large-scale offensive on the positions of Yemeni forces in the energy-rich province of Ma’rib.
“No flights [into and out of Sana’a International Airport] are allowed yet. Despite having undergone inspection and received UN clearance, ships are detained and taken away to Jizan port [in southern Saudi Arabia],” he asserted, pointing to the blatant breaches.
“All the arbitrary measures are taken in light of a truce welcomed by the international community. We are facing adversaries who do not respect their obligations,” he hastened to add.
Last week, the UN special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, announced the nationwide ceasefire, for the first time since 2016, saying the two-month truce would be eligible for renewal with the consent of parties.