Alwaght- The heads of three UN agencies issued a fresh plea on Thursday for the Saudi-led military coalition to lift its inhuman blockade on Yemen.
Without aid shipments, “untold thousands of innocent victims, among them many children, will die,” the heads of the World Food Program, UNICEF and the World Health Organization said.
One million children are at risk from a fast-spreading diphtheria outbreak, and even if the blockade is only partially lifted, an additional 3.2 million people will be pushed into hunger, the joint statement said.
Aid organizations in Yemen said they were "greatly alarmed" by Saudi Arabia's decision, warning it could "bring millions of people closer to starvation and death".
"The current stock of vaccines in the country will only last one month. If it is not replenished, outbreaks of communicable diseases, such as polio and measles, are to be expected with fatal consequences, particularly for children under five years of age and those already suffering from malnutrition," said Oxfam, Save the Children, the Norwegian Refugee Council and 19 other aid groups in a joint statement.
"The humanitarian situation in Yemen is extremely fragile and any disruption in the pipeline of critical supplies such as food, fuel and medicines has the potential to bring millions of people closer to starvation and death," they added.
Since the start of Sunday's US-backed Saudi siege on Yemen, the country's already inflated food and fuel prices have skyrocketed, while flights delivering much-needed humanitarian aid have been prevented from landing.
Since March 2015, Yemen has been under a brutal aggression by Saudi-led coalition. Over 13,000 Yemenis, mostly civilians including women and children thousands have been killed and thousands more injured in Saudi-led bombardments.
The Saudi-led coalition, backed by the US, has been also imposing a blockade on the impoverished country’s ports and airports as a part of its aggression which is aimed at ousting the popular Ansarullah movement and restoring to power fugitive former president Abdurabbuh Mansour Hadi.
However, Yemeni forces and their local allies including Ansarullah fighters have heroically confronting the Saudi-led aggression by all means.
