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Other members of the G20 have exported more than US$17bn worth of arms to Saudi Arabia since it became involved in the conflict in Yemen in 2015 but have given only a third of that amount in aid to people caught in the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis, Oxfam said today.

Oxfam and eleven other aid agencies have called on the Saudi-led coalition to lift restrictions on Yemeni airspace in order to allow for the reopening of the country’s main airport, Sana’a International, and to allow humanitarian flights to resume. 

In reaction to the reprehensible attack that killed 13 civilians, including children, in the north of Yemen yesterday, Oxfam and seven other international agencies working in Yemen strongly condemned the attack.

The agencies call on all parties to the conflict to protect civilians, facilitate safe passage of those trapped in conflict areas, allow humanitarian access to those in need and cease damage to vital infrastructure.

A quarter of all civilian casualties across Yemen in 2019 were recorded in Hudaydah governorate. Despite a ceasefire in the port city being at the heart of last year’s Stockholm Agreement, Hudaydah has seen 799 civilian deaths and injuries since the Agreement was signed, the highest toll countrywide.

Humanitarian agencies are calling on the international community to support a lasting solution that could save the lives of millions of civilians in Yemen, as the United Nations prepares to host peace talks on Sunday June 14th in Geneva.

“Oxfam calls for the immediate appointment of a new UN Personal Envoy for Western Sahara to restart the peace process without any further delay. The lack of progress has led to rising frustration within the refugee camps that the Western Sahara crisis is once again being forgotten by the international community, and risks the positive momentum towards a political solution that former Personal Envoy Horst Koehler had begun.”

Six months ago UN Secretary General called in March for a global ceasefire tied to the COVID-19 pandemic. We are now sleepwalking towards a seventh year of war, and the people of Yemen can only surmise that the world has forgotten them.

Lack of fuel in Yemen caused by the continuing conflict and restrictions of imports could ultimately be responsible for even more deaths than the fighting in the country, Oxfam warned today.

Oxfam and 5 other aid agencies have condemned the latest Saudi-led coalition airstrike on a hospital supported by MSF and have called for an investigation.