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Red Cross Prepares Emergency Medical Airlift for Yemen Expedited Weapons Deliveries to Saudi Arabia Signal Deepening U.S. Involvement
(about 5 hours later)
GENEVA — The International Committee of the Red Cross said Tuesday it was scrambling to airlift medical supplies to Yemen to help hospitals struggling with heavy casualties caused by fierce fighting, particularly in the southern city of Aden. CAIRO — The United States said on Tuesday that it was expediting deliveries of weapons to Saudi Arabia, a sign of the Obama administration’s deepening involvement in the Saudi military offensive against the Houthi movement in Yemen.
Speaking to reporters in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, Antony J. Blinken, the deputy secretary of state, said the United States had also increased its intelligence sharing and established a “joint coordination planning cell” with the Saudi government to help its war effort, according to the Reuters news agency.
The show of support by the United States came two weeks after the Saudi military launched an air war against the Houthis, members of a rebel movement from northern Yemen that has seized territory and steadily expanded its influence in the country in the past eight months.
The Saudis said they were aiming to restore stability to Yemen by crippling the Houthis and returning President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who is backed by the Americans and the Saudis, to power. On Tuesday, Mr. Blinken praised the Saudis for “sending a strong message to the Houthis and their allies that they cannot overrun Yemen by force,” according to Reuters.
The Houthis have defended their military actions, including the capture of the capital, Sana, in September, as part of an effort to overturn a corrupt political order in Yemen. The Houthis, who are allied with forces loyal to Yemen’s former autocratic president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, have seemed undeterred by the relentless Saudi bombing.
The fighting and the airstrikes have led to widespread civilian suffering in Yemen, the Middle East’s poorest country, and warnings by international relief agencies of an unfolding humanitarian disaster.
More than 540 people have been killed and 1,700 wounded by the fighting since March 19, Christian Lindmeier, a spokesman for the World Health Organization, told reporters in Geneva.More than 540 people have been killed and 1,700 wounded by the fighting since March 19, Christian Lindmeier, a spokesman for the World Health Organization, told reporters in Geneva.
At least 74 children are known to have been killed in fighting since March 26 and 44 “maimed,” Christophe Boulierac, the spokesman for the United Nations children’s agency, reported. At least 74 children are known to have been killed in fighting since March 26, and 44 others have been “maimed,” Christophe Boulierac, the Unicef spokesman, reported.
Aid agencies, however, fear the toll is much higher in Yemen, the Middle East’s most impoverished country. A Saudi-led military coalition has been bombing there for the past two weeks in an effort to defeat the insurgent Houthi movement and restore Yemen’s exiled president, Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi. Aid agencies, however, fear the toll of the conflict is much higher. The intensity of the fighting in Aden, Yemen’s second-largest city, has prevented medical teams from collecting the many bodies reportedly strewn on its streets, said Sitara Jabeen, a spokeswoman for the Red Cross in Geneva, citing reports from the organization’s staff members in the city.
The intensity of the fighting in Aden has prevented medical teams from collecting the many bodies reportedly strewn around the city’s streets, said Sitara Jabeen, a spokeswoman for the Red Cross in Geneva, citing reports from the organization’s staff members in the city.
“Every day is worse than the previous day,” Ms. Jabeen said in an interview. “Aden at the moment is like a ghost town. People don’t come out of their homes. Some areas are cut off from any help.”“Every day is worse than the previous day,” Ms. Jabeen said in an interview. “Aden at the moment is like a ghost town. People don’t come out of their homes. Some areas are cut off from any help.”
A cargo aircraft was being loaded Tuesday night in Amman, Jordan, with 16 tons of Red Cross medical supplies, mostly kits for treating the wounded, Ms. Jabeen said, and it was to fly to Sana, the Yemeni capital, Wednesday morning. The International Committee of the Red Cross said Tuesday that it was working to airlift medical supplies to Yemen to help hospitals struggling with heavy casualties, particularly in Aden. A cargo aircraft was being loaded Tuesday night in Amman, Jordan, with 16 tons of Red Cross medical supplies, mostly kits for treating the wounded, Ms. Jabeen said, and it was to fly to Sana on Wednesday morning.
A second flight loaded with 32 tons of supplies, including medical kits, generators and hospital tents, was scheduled to leave Geneva in time to reach Sana before midday on Thursday, she said. With Yemenis increasingly trapped in their disintegrating country, several nations have scrambled to evacuate foreigners. India has mounted the most ambitious effort, aimed at airlifting 4,000 people to safety. China has also evacuated foreigners by sea.
Aden cannot be reached by air because of damage to the airport, but a seven-person Red Cross surgical unit was standing by in nearby Djibouti, on the Horn of Africa, preparing to cross to Aden by sea. Joel Millman, a spokesman for the International Organization for Migration, said that the group had identified at least 2,000 people who were ready to be evacuated immediately and that it had chartered planes to begin moving them out, possibly as soon as Wednesday.
The Red Cross unit was unable to make the crossing Tuesday when fighting was reported in the port, and it had not received clearance to travel to the city. The United States, which closed its embassy in Yemen in February, has said it has no plans to evacuate its citizens. The State Department has told Americans to contact either the International Organization for Migration or the Indian Embassy, or to try to find a boat to travel to Djibouti.
At the United Nations, Jordan — a member of the Saudi-led coalition and the current holder of the Security Council presidency — was reported to have privately circulated a draft resolution calling for a political solution to the Yemen crisis and a way to expedite aid, according to The Associated Press, which quoted an unidentified source. Jordanian diplomats did not reply to messages seeking comment. Summer Nasser, 20, a Yemeni-American student from Concordia College in New York, was among those stranded in Yemen, having returned there in February to help her family leave as the political crisis worsened.
This would be the third draft of a Security Council resolution on Yemen distributed in the past few days. Russia has proposed one calling for a humanitarian pause in fighting. The Gulf Cooperation Council, in which Saudi Arabia is the dominant member, has proposed calling for an arms embargo on the Houthi movement, which the Saudis regard as a proxy force for their regional rival, Iran. Ms. Nasser, who left Aden for the relative safety of her family’s village, said she had little information about whether there was room on the flights for her mother and four siblings, whom she was eager to get out of the country.
“I understand the U.S. has given warnings” to leave the country, she said. But as the chaos in Yemen has worsened, Ms. Nasser said, she has become “ashamed” that the Obama administration is not doing more.