Humanitarian Aid Ship Sets Sail for Yemen

TEHRAN (Dispatches) -- An Iranian cargo ship was setting sail for the Yemeni port of Hodeida on Sunday evening, Iran's Tasnim news agency said.

Date: 10 May 2015 - 21:42

News ID: ۱۳۷۳۱

Yemen's Houthi fighters earlier on Sunday accepted a five-day ceasefire proposed by Saudi Arabia after more than a month of bombing that has caused severe shortages of food, medicine and fuel.
Tasnim reported that the cargo ship would carry 2,500 tonnes of humanitarian aid including food staples, tents and medicine, donated by the Iranian Red Crescent Society (IRCS).
Saudi warplanes destroyed the runway of Sanaa airport last month to prevent an Iranian plane carrying humanitarian aid from landing.
Yemen imports more than 90% of its food and aid agencies have warned of a humanitarian catastrophe.
Supported by the United States, the Saudis began airstrikes against the Houthis and the Yemeni army on March 26 with the aim of restoring the government of former fugitive president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
The cargo ship called Nejat was about to leave the southern Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas.
Secretary General of the IRCS Ali Asghar Ahmadi said on May 7 that the IRCS has been unable to airlift humanitarian aid to Yemen due to Saudi Arabia's blockade of the country; therefore, coordination was made with certain Persian Gulf littoral states to dispatch the aid through sea.
He said that Iran has made the necessary coordination with the Yemeni Red Crescent Society as well as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and held consultations with Saudi Arabia’s Red Crescent Society to dispatch the cargo ship.
Last week, the IRCS dispatched relief aid to people in Yemen through Oman as Riyadh had earlier blocked Iran's humanitarian aid delivery.
Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hussein Amir-Abdollahian has said Iran considers all options for helping the Yemeni people and immediate dispatch of humanitarian aid and transfer of the injured.
According to the latest UN figures, the Saudi military campaign has so far claimed the lives of over 1,400 people and injured close to 6,000 people, roughly half of whom have been civilians.
On Sunday, Amir-Abdollahian called on the UN special envoy to Yemen to intervene and halt Saudi war on Yemen and prevent a humanitarian catastrophe from taking place in the impoverished state.
"The Islamic Republic of Iran expects Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed, the UN secretary general's envoy to Yemen, to immediately travel to this country and take action for halting strikes and preventing the intensification of humanitarian catastrophe," he said in a telephone conversation with UN Under-Secretary-General and Emergency Relief Coordinator Valerie Amos.
The Iranian official denounced Saudi Arabia’s airstrikes against Yemeni infrastructure and civilian targets in the northwestern province of Saada and the northern province of Amran over the past two days.
He said destruction of airports, which had been prepared to handle relief aid supplied by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and international aid organizations, is a "blatant violation of international and humanitarian laws.”
Amir-Abdollahian expressed Iran’s readiness to send fuel and petroleum products to various Yemeni ports in full coordination with the UN relief program and also dispatch medical teams and set up field hospitals in the cities of Sanaa, Saada and Aden.
"Iran is ready to immediately send relief and food cargoes either through air routes to Djibouti or directly to Yemen,” he said.
Amir-Abdollahian also stated that Tehran is ready to swiftly fly those injured in the Saudi airstrikes to Iran for medical treatment.
Amos, for her part, commended Iran’s support for relief operations in Yemen, saying the United Nations has prepared comprehensive plans to help civilians in the war-hit country.
She added that Iran’s humanitarian aid would be dispatched to Yemen in line with the UN relief work.
The Al Saud regime has imposed a blockade on the delivery of relief supplies to the war-stricken people of Yemen in defiance of calls by international aid groups.
Earlier this week, the ICRC and medical charity group, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), known in English as Doctors Without Borders, expressed "extreme” concern about the Saudi airstrikes on Yemen’s lifelines and its obstruction of aid deliveries to the impoverished nation.