Category Archives: Yemen

One in four countries beset by civil strife as global unrest soars

Posted on by

Researchers predict worldwide turmoil will continue in 2020, with Venezuela, Iran and Libya at greatest risk

A quarter of all countries experienced a dramatic surge in civil unrest last year in a worrying trend that is likely to continue into 2020, researchers have found.

Verisk Maplecroft, a leading risk analysis and strategic forecasting company, said in a report published on Thursday that 47 countries experienced a significant rise in the number of protests over the course of the past year. Hong Kong, Chile, Nigeria, Sudan, Haiti and Lebanon were among the states affected.

Continue reading...

Yemen heads list of countries facing worst humanitarian disasters in 2020

Posted on by

Venezuela also in top five as IRC’s David Miliband warns of devastating impact from war, floods, droughts and disease

Yemen has topped an annual watchlist of countries most likely to face humanitarian catastrophe in 2020, for the second year running.

Continued fighting, economic collapse and weak governance mean that more than 24 million Yemenis – about 80% of the population – will be in need of humanitarian assistance this year, according to analysis by the International Rescue Committee (IRC), which found that another five years of conflict could cost $29bn (£22bn).

Continue reading...

Failure to end civil war in Yemen now could cost $29bn

Posted on by

NGO warns conflict may drag on for five years if current peace efforts fail

A failure to capture the present rare chance for peace in Yemen may potentially cost the international community $29bn (£22bn) in further humanitarian aid if the current civil war continues for another five years, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) warns on Monday in a new report.

It is also likely to prolong Yemen’s inability to return to pre-crisis levels of hunger by 20 years just as famine conditions are improving.

Continue reading...

Reopening Sana’a airport ‘critical first step’ for Yemenis needing medical care

Posted on by

Patients requiring life-saving treatment to be allowed to fly, but aid agencies say imports of medicine and humanitarian aid crucial

Aid agencies have welcomed news from the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen that it will allow some flights out of Houthi-held Sana’a, for Yemeni civilians requiring life-saving medical treatment.

As many as 32,000 people in need of overseas medical care may have died since the airport closed to commercial flights in August 2016, according to ministry of health estimates. The figures have not been verified independently, but in 2017 the UN estimated that up to 20,000 people had been denied access to potentially life-saving healthcare due to restrictions on airspace.

Continue reading...

Yemen government signs power-sharing deal with separatists

Posted on by

Deal aims to create cohesive government capable of challenging Houthi forces

Yemen’s UN-recognised government has signed a Saudi Arabian-brokered power sharing agreement with separatists in the south of the countryafter months of fighting in the area.

The deal aims to create a new, cohesive government capable of challenging the Iranian-backed Houthi forces that control the capital, Sana’a, and the north.

Continue reading...

‘Manhattan of the desert’: civil war puts Yemen’s ancient skyscrapers at risk

Posted on by

In addition to the conflict’s huge human cost, Yemen’s rich cultural heritage has been ravaged, from the Queen of Sheba’s reputed throne room to the mudbrick high-rises of Shibam

On the edge of the vast Empty Quarter desert that dominates the Arabian peninsula, white and brown towers rise together out of the valley floor like tall sandcastles. Once they welcomed weary caravans traversing the Silk Roads: now they stand as testimony to the ingenuity of a lost civilisation.

This is the ancient walled city of Shibam, nicknamed the “Manhattan of the desert” by the British explorer Freya Stark in the 1930s, in modern-day Yemen, a country also home to an untold number of other archeological treasures. The kingdom of Saba, ruled by the legendary Queen of Sheba, and many other dynasties of the ancient world rose and fell here, their fortunes linked to Yemen’s position at the crossroads of early frankincense and spice trades between Africa and Asia.

Continue reading...

A father’s grief and the Made in USA bomb dropped in Yemen

Posted on by

Cluster bomb, a type of munition invented by the Nazis to kill as many as possible, used in coalition strike on farm that killed Raja, 14

The last day of 14-year-old Raja Hamid Yahya al-Oud’s life began like any other.

She got up early along with the rest of the family because there was always a lot of work to do on the farm in the spring planting season. White drones had intermittently circled above their cornfields for the last few weeks, but there was no sign of them that morning.

Continue reading...

UK stance on Khashoggi murder betrayed by unlawful arms sales to Saudis

Posted on by

The UK government’s continued loyalty to Saudi Arabia is causing its ‘rigorous and robust’ arms export control regime to descend into tatters

Wednesday marked the anniversary of the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Outrage at his death at the time served as a trigger for public reckoning over US and UK support for Saudi Arabia and its involvement in the war in Yemen.

At that point, the war was three and a half years old, notable for airstrike attacks on civilians and a blockade that has pushed millions into famine – violations of international law, some of which that may amount to war crimes. The murder of a prominent western-friendly journalist seemed to be the final straw.

Continue reading...

Yemen: Aden’s changing alliances erupt into four-year conflict’s newest front

Posted on by

Fighting in the south between separatists and government forces points to why peace is even more elusive

Every soldier in the Yemeni city of Aden is on edge. The main checkpoint on the coastal road has two large holes in the roof from mortar shells and the beach has been dug up into berms to slow the advance of any hostile vehicles.

The problem is that the 25 men milling around their posts are not sure what their enemy looks like. In the recent fighting which saw the separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC) eject from the city troops loyal to the exiled Yemeni president – their former allies – al-Qaida took advantage of the chaos, putting on STC uniforms to ambush the soldiers here.

Continue reading...

Houthis claim to have killed 500 Saudi soldiers in major attack

Posted on by

Yemen militant group says it captured further 2,000 troops in operation in Saudi Arabia

Houthi rebels in Yemen say they have killed 500 Saudi soldiers, captured a further 2,000 and seized a convoy of Saudi military vehicles.

The extraordinary claims at a press conference on Sunday, involving still photographs and inconclusive videos of captured soldiers, many not in uniform, could not be corroborated, and there was no independent confirmation from Saudi Arabia.

Continue reading...

UN Yemen envoy welcomes Houthi offer to halt attacks on Saudi Arabia

Posted on by

Proposal by Iran-backed rebels ‘could send message of the will to end the war,’ says Martin Griffiths

The United Nations envoy for Yemen has welcomed an offer from the country’s Houthi rebels to halt all attacks on Saudi Arabia, saying it could bring an end to years of bloody conflict.

Implementation of the initiative by the Houthis “in good faith could send a powerful message of the will to end the war,” special envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths said.

Continue reading...

Iran threatens ‘all-out war’ if action taken over Saudi oil strike

Posted on by

Foreign minister’s comments further inflame tensions in Persian Gulf after oil attacks

Iran’s foreign minister has warned that any attack on his country after a series of missile strikes on Saudi Arabia’s oil industry would result in “all-out war”.

Javad Zarif also demanded that Riyadh hand over the evidence that it claimed proved the attack came from Iran, and not from Houthi-occupied Yemen.

Continue reading...

Middle East drones signal end to era of fast jet air supremacy

Posted on by

Tiny, cheap, unmanned and hard-to-detect aircraft are transforming conflicts across region

In the history of modern warfare, “own the skies, win the war” has been a constant maxim. Countries with the best technology and biggest budgets have devoted tens of billions to building modern air forces, confident they will continue to give their militaries primacy in almost any conflict.

Tiny, cheap, unmanned aircraft have changed that, especially over the battlefields of the Middle East. In the past three months alone, drones have made quite an impact in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and possibly now Saudi Arabia, where half the country’s oil production - and up to 7% of the world’s global supply – has been taken offline by a blitz that caused no air raid sirens and seems to have eluded the region’s most advanced air warning systems.

Continue reading...

Everything you need to know about the Saudi Arabia oil attacks

Posted on by

Saturday’s drone attacks severely disrupted global energy infrastructure and sent oil price soaring

Saudi pipelines, oil installations and tankers have occasionally been attacked over the past two years, but analysts say what happened in eastern Saudi Arabia in the early hours of Saturday morning is a much larger escalation: a hit to the jugular of the kingdom’s oil industry.

Continue reading...

Iran denies launching drone attacks on Saudi oil facility

Posted on by

Foreign ministry counters accusations from US secretary of state with threats to US bases

Iran has dismissed US accusations that it was responsible for a series of explosive drone attacks on the world’s largest petroleum processing facility in Saudi Arabia that disrupted more than half of the kingdom’s oil output and could affect global supplies.

Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi rebel group claimed responsibility for launching waves of drones at state-owned Saudi Aramco facilities early on Saturday morning. But the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said there was no evidence the drones were launched in Yemen and accused Iran of “an unprecedented attack on the world’s energy supply”.

Continue reading...

Saudi attack dampens faint chance of a Trump-Iran meeting

Posted on by

Despite no specific evidence of Iranian involvement, the US treat Yemen’s Houthi rebels as tame creatures of Tehran

The US secretary of state Mike Pompeo’s bald claim this weekend that Iran was responsible for the attack on the Saudi oilfields came with no marshalled public evidence, but dampens any likelihood that Donald Trump will countenance a meeting with Tehran in the near future or press ahead with tentative peace talks with Houthi rebels in Oman.

Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s foreign policy supporters in the Senate, was clear talks with Iran are now off the agenda saying: “The Iranian regime is not interested in peace – they’re pursuing nuclear weapons and regional dominance.”

Continue reading...

Drone attacks on Saudi plant could hit global oil supplies

Posted on by

Explosions halve Saudi output and reduce global production by 5%

Global supplies of oil are likely to suffer a “major jolt” following Saturday’s attack by a swarm of explosive drones on the world’s biggest oil processing plant in Saudia Arabia.

Major fires engulfed the Abqaiq processing facility and the Khurais oil field after the attack, for which Houthi rebels in Yemen claimed responsibility. They said they launched 10 drones with “intelligence cooperation from people inside Saudi Arabia”, according to the rebel-run Saba news agency. The rebels’ spokesman Yahya Saree said their operations “will expand and would be more painful as long as the Saudi regime continues its aggression and blockade” on Yemen, he said.The fires are now under control at both facilities, Saudi state media said.

Continue reading...

Major Saudi Arabia oil facilities hit by Houthi drone strikes

Posted on by

Yemen’s rebel movement says it launched strikes that sparked huge fire at processing facility

Houthi rebels have claimed responsibility for a drone attack on the world’s largest oil processing facility in Saudi Arabia which is vital to global energy supplies.

The attacks on the processor and a major oilfield, operated by Saudi Aramco, on early Saturday sparked a huge fire, the kingdom’s interior ministry said.

Continue reading...

Saudi Arabia: major fire at world’s largest oil refinery after drone attack – video

Posted on by

Houthi drones attacked the world's largest oil processing facility in Saudi Arabia and a major oilfield operated by Saudi Aramco early on Saturday, sparking a huge fire at a processor vital to global energy supplies. It was not clear if there were any injuries in the attacks, nor whether they would affect the country's oil production

Continue reading...

UK, US and France may be complicit in Yemen war crimes – UN report

Posted on by

Panel lists 160 key actors in Yemen war who could face charges, adding to pressure on UK to end Saudi arms sales

Britain, the US and France may be complicit in war crimes in Yemen by arming and providing support to a Saudi-led coalition that starves civilians as a war tactic, a United Nations report has said.

A UN panel of experts has for the first time compiled a list of 160 military officers and politicians who could face war crimes charges, including from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the Houthi rebel movement and Yemeni government military forces. A secret list of those most likely to be complicit has been sent to the UN.

Continue reading...