Yemen facing 'disastrous' hunger amid conflict, Red Sea crisis

Food insecurity in Yemen has reached "disastrous levels", the UN warned on Tuesday, with more than 17 million people going hungry every day in the Gulf peninsula's poorest country.

Ramesh Rajasingham, the director of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), said the only way to prevent the hunger crisis in Yemen from escalating is through a political settlement in the war-torn country.

This would eventually pave the way for more humanitarian assistance.

In a briefing to the UN Security Council, Rajasingham added that Yemen is one of the most food-insecure countries in the world. With the continued collapse of the economy, the disruption of livelihoods, and the increasing pressure on food supplies, many families can "no longer afford" to eat, according to Rajasingham.

Speaking on behalf of OCHA's Under-Secretary-General Tom Fletcher, Rajasingham also highlighted the heightened malnutrition levels impacting Yemen’s children. Nearly half of children under the age of five are stunted due to a lack of nutrition and often extreme hunger.

UNICEF has called the malnutrition rate among Yemeni children "a statistic that is almost unparalleled across the world".

In a bid to survive, Rajasingham said Yemeni families are resorting to "terrible decisions", such as selling land and livestock, removing children from schools, and marrying off adolescent daughters for money.

The country’s humanitarian situation has been exacerbated by the ongoing Red Sea crisis, where the Houthis have carried out frequent attacks against Israeli and Western-linked ships passing through the sea inlet in response to Tel Aviv’s deadly onslaught on the Gaza Strip.

The Houthis’ attacks, while hailed by many for being carried out in solidarity with Gaza’s Palestinians, have obstructed mediation efforts in Yemen, the country’s UN envoy Hans Grundberg said.

Grundberg warned that Israel’s strikes, as well as sporadic US and UK ones carried out in response to the Houthis’ actions, are "immensely draining" Yemen’s already-fragile infrastructure.

The Gaza war spillover between Israel and the Houthis has impacted the arrival of ships carrying humanitarian aid, he added. Only two ships berthed in Yemen in July, according to the envoy.

The Houthi rebels control the capital Sanaa, much of the country’s northwest and the Red Sea coast.

Human Rights Watch has also placed the blame on Yemeni authorities for neglecting their duty of care towards Yemen's citizens, resulting in heightened starvation levels.

Following the UN’s warning, Yemen’s UN envoy Abdullah Al-Saadi urged the international community to increase its donations to the country, saying Yemen "stands on the threshold of a difficult phase" and cannot "stabilise without sustained external assistance".

Rajasingham also made a plea at the UNSC briefing for increased international assistance to the country, stressing that starvation can be avoided if "we act now".

Yemen ranks among the most hunger-stricken countries in the world, where poverty levels have been exacerbated by a years-long civil war, including the Saudi-led intervention.

Famine was officially declared in 2016. No exact figures for the death toll are available, but more than 220,000 Yemenis, including tens of thousands of children, are thought to have died from hunger and disease over the years.