The Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthi movement in Yemen said that it was closing all air, land and sea ports. Hardship is intensifying for millions in Yemen, reeling from war, starvation and a major cholera epidemic, after its borders were closed, blocking vital food and medical deliveries, an aid worker said.
"People have adapted to the situation but they can't take it anymore," Adnan Hizam, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "They need the nightmare of the conflict to stop." Hizam continued "People are fed up. They are just trying to survive. Every morning people are looking for water, waiting in line to get gas, and trying to work." The price of fuel jumped 60 percent "overnight" and the price of cooking gas doubled. This is a major problem for hospitals, which rely on fuel to run generators.
Yemen faces the world's largest famine in decades "with millions of victims" if aid deliveries are not resumed, Mark Lowcock, the UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs has warned. "I have told the council that unless those measures are lifted... there will be a famine in Yemen", Mr Lowcock told reporters. "It will be the largest famine the world has seen for many decades with millions of victims."
Doctors Without Borders (MSF), reported on Wednesday that it had been denied clearance for its flights into Yemen for the past three days. "The broader impact of this blockade on the men, women and children of Yemen is already evident and it puts hundreds of thousands of lives at risk," MSF's head of mission in Yemen, Justin Armstrong, said.
The ICRC and the United Nations have urged the Saudi-led coalition to re-open the border to allow life-saving aid in. A quarter of Yemen's 28 million people are starving, while half a million children under the age of five are suffering life-threatening malnutrition. The Arabian Peninsula nation is also battling one of the world's worst cholera outbreaks, which has infected about 900,000 people and killed more than 2,100 since April.
The ICRC said that a shipment of chlorine tablets to prevent cholera did not get border clearance and voiced fears for 50,000 vials of insulin for diabetics due to be delivered by next week, which require constant refrigeration.
"People have adapted to the situation but they can't take it anymore," Adnan Hizam, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "They need the nightmare of the conflict to stop." Hizam continued "People are fed up. They are just trying to survive. Every morning people are looking for water, waiting in line to get gas, and trying to work." The price of fuel jumped 60 percent "overnight" and the price of cooking gas doubled. This is a major problem for hospitals, which rely on fuel to run generators.
Yemen faces the world's largest famine in decades "with millions of victims" if aid deliveries are not resumed, Mark Lowcock, the UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs has warned. "I have told the council that unless those measures are lifted... there will be a famine in Yemen", Mr Lowcock told reporters. "It will be the largest famine the world has seen for many decades with millions of victims."
Doctors Without Borders (MSF), reported on Wednesday that it had been denied clearance for its flights into Yemen for the past three days. "The broader impact of this blockade on the men, women and children of Yemen is already evident and it puts hundreds of thousands of lives at risk," MSF's head of mission in Yemen, Justin Armstrong, said.
The ICRC and the United Nations have urged the Saudi-led coalition to re-open the border to allow life-saving aid in. A quarter of Yemen's 28 million people are starving, while half a million children under the age of five are suffering life-threatening malnutrition. The Arabian Peninsula nation is also battling one of the world's worst cholera outbreaks, which has infected about 900,000 people and killed more than 2,100 since April.
The ICRC said that a shipment of chlorine tablets to prevent cholera did not get border clearance and voiced fears for 50,000 vials of insulin for diabetics due to be delivered by next week, which require constant refrigeration.
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