DUBAI: More than four million Yemenis will receive less food assistance as a result of funding shortages, compounding one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, the UN’s food agency warned Friday.
The World Food Programme said “a deeper funding crisis for its Yemen operations from the end of September onward... will force WFP to make difficult decisions about further cuts to our food assistance programs across the country in the coming months.”
Without new funding, it expects more than four million people will receive less food assistance, many of them women and children already suffering from some of the highest malnutrition rates in the world.
With major cuts announced across different programs, the actual number of people affected could be higher.
“We are confronted with the incredibly tough reality of making decisions to take food from the hungry to feed the starving,” said Richard Ragan, WFP’s Yemen representative.
The UN agency was “fully cognizant of the suffering these cuts will cause,” he said in a statement.
Yemen, the Arabian Peninsula’s poorest country, is already in the grips of one of the planet’s worst humanitarian crises after eight years of war, according to the United Nations.
The conflict broke out in 2014 when Iran-backed Houthi rebels seized the capital Sanaa, prompting a Saudi-led coalition to intervene the following year to prop up the internationally recognized government.
Although fighting has remained largely on hold since a six-month truce expired in October, the United Nations says current hunger levels are unprecedented.
Seventeen million Yemenis are experiencing food insecurity, and one million women and 2.2 million children under five require treatment for acute malnutrition, the UN says.
For the next six months, WFP said it requires $1.05 billion in funding, only 28 percent of which has been secured.
“Yemen will remain one of WFP’s largest food assistance operations, but these cuts represent a significant reduction to the agency’s programs in the country,” it said.
“The funding shortages are happening at a time of more people becoming severely malnourished.”
The World Food Programme was forced to slash food aid for 13 million Yemenis by more than 50 percent in June last year because of a funding squeeze.
UN says forced to cut Yemen rations, compounding food crisis
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UN says forced to cut Yemen rations, compounding food crisis
- Without new funding, World Food Programme expects more than four million people will receive less food assistance
UN chief condemns Israeli law blocking electricity, water for UNRWA facilities
- The agency provides education, health and aid to millions of Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria
United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres condemned on Wednesday a move by Israel to ban electricity or water to facilities owned by the UN Palestinian refugee agency, a UN spokesperson said.
The spokesperson said the move would “further impede” the agency’s ability to operate and carry out activities.
“The Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations remains applicable to UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East), its property and assets, and to its officials and other personnel. Property used by UNRWA is inviolable,” Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for the secretary-general, said while adding that UNRWA is an “integral” part of the world body.
UNRWA Commissioner General Phillipe Lazzarini also condemned the move, saying that it was part of an ongoing “ systematic campaign to discredit UNRWA and thereby obstruct” the role it plays in providing assistance to Palestinian refugees.
In 2024, the Israeli parliament passed a law banning the agency from operating in the country and prohibiting officials from having contact with the agency.
As a result, UNRWA operates in East Jerusalem, which the UN considers territory occupied by Israel. Israel considers all Jerusalem to be part of the country.
The agency provides education, health and aid to millions of Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. It has long had tense relations with Israel but ties have deteriorated sharply since the start of the war in Gaza and Israel has called repeatedly for UNRWA to be disbanded, with its responsibilities transferred to other UN agencies.
The prohibition of basic utilities to the UN agency came as Israel also suspended of dozens of international non-governmental organizations working in Gaza due to a failure to meet new rules to vet those groups.
In a joint statement, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Japan, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom said on Tuesday such a move would have a severe impact on the access of essential services, including health care. They said one in three health care facilities in Gaza would close if international NGO operations stopped.
