UNITED NATIONS: The seven-year war in Yemen has witnessed a dangerous escalation, with January’s civilian casualties the highest in at least three years and eight million Yemenis likely to lose all humanitarian aid next month without urgent new funds, UN officials said on Tuesday.

UN special envoy Hans Grundberg and UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths painted a worsening picture of the already dire situation in the Arab world’s poorest nation. They said the past month brought a multiplication of combat zones and the end of January saw nearly two-thirds of major UN aid programmes being scaled back or closed.

Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014, when the Iran-backed Houthi rebels took control of the capital, Sanaa, and much of the country’s north, forcing the government to flee to the south, then to Saudi Arabia. A Saudi-led coalition entered the war in March 2015, backed by the US and United Arab Emirates, to try restore President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi to power.

Grundberg warned the UN Security Council that recent attacks by the Houthis on the UAE and Saudi Arabia indicate how this conflict risks spiraling out of control unless serious efforts are urgently made by the Yemeni parties, the region and the international community to end the conflict.

He said a coalition air strike on a detention facility in Houthi-controlled Saada was the worst civilian casualty incident in three years, and he pointed at an alarming increase in air strikes in Yemen, including on residential areas in Sanaa and the port area of Hodeida.

Griffiths said more than 650 civilians were killed or injured in January by air strikes, shelling, small arms fire and other violence, by far the highest toll in at least three years.

Published in Dawn, February 17th, 2022