News - Yemen: 98 international and national actors delivering the humanitarian response in Yemen have published a joint statement, attached, highlighting the ongoing crisis and urgent funding gap.

After more than eight years of US-Saudi aggression,siege, over 21.6 million Yemenis continue to face massive humanitarian needs, including food insecurity, lack of access to safe water and sanitation, quality health care services and high risk of cholera and other deadly diseases, said the statement.

It added: “close to 18 million people, particularly women and children, require protection assistance and services, while an estimated 209,000 migrants and more than 71,000 refugees and asylum seekers remain in dire need of humanitarian assistance throughout the country.”

Furthermore, Yemen remains one of the world’s most contaminated countries, with explosive remnants of war (ERW) leading to death and maiming, particularly children.

The international community should support Yemen by investing in an economic financial package to foster economic recovery and invest in durable solutions to displacement. At the same time, the ongoing humanitarian needs must not be ignored. 

The funding gap has steadily risen over the last five years, and today, the Yemen Humanitarian Response Plan is funded at only 31.2 percent, against the total requirement (USD 4.34 billion), according to the statement.

Saudi Arabia, backed by the United States and regional allies, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, claiming the goal of bringing the government of former Yemeni president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi back to power.

The US-Saudi aggression continues to target neighborhoods and populated areas and destroy the infrastructure and capabilities of the country, in light of a suspicious international silence.

The war has left hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead and displaced millions more. It has also destroyed Yemen’s infrastructure and spread famine and infectious diseases there.