Yemen calls on UN to protect aid deliveries

The Yemeni government yesterday asked the UN to reroute aid headed for Taiz and send it through Aden instead of Hudaydah to ensure its safety.

Read: UN receives only 7% of humanitarian aid required for Yemen

In a letter from Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdulmalik Al-Makhlafi to United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Yemen, Jimmy McGoldrick, the Yemeni official called for “a change of the relief route to the city of Taiz, through the safe areas, the southern port of Aden, which is subject to the legitimate government, not the Hudaydah port under the Houthis.

“He pointed out that “the Houthis, have been holding, since last Sunday, about 180 trucks loaded with relief aid, and obstruct access to the besieged city of Taiz.”

The Houthis have also confiscated medicines and medical equipment belonging to the dialysis centre of Al-Thawra Hospital in Taiz.

He expressed his hope that these practices would be condemned publicly, “to intervene urgently, and to exert relentless efforts to pressure the militias to release the convoys of relief, and allow the entry of all types of food and relief.”