Rights group warns blocking aid in Yemen endangers millions

Yemen’s warring parties are obstructing crucial aid to the Red Sea port of Hudeida endangering millions in what is already the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, an international rights group said Friday, as battles there between Shiite rebels and the Saudi-led coalition fighting them rage on.

Amnesty International blamed the Iran-backed rebels, known as Houthis, for their “excessive and arbitrary bureaucratic procedures” that are restricting the movement of humanitarian workers and causing delays in aid delivery across Yemen. In a report published Thursday, Amnesty cited aid workers as saying that the rebels exert influence over who receives aid, where and by which organizations. They also said the Houthis work in a “fragmented manner” that hampers timely distribution of aid.

Several aid workers also described incidents in which the Houthis demanded money to approve aid projects or authorize deliveries, threatening “to cancel projects if a bribe was not paid.”

The report, titled “Stranglehold,” also said the coalition is carrying out “excessive” inspections of aid and imposing restrictions over the delivery of essential goods such as food, fuel and medical supplies into Yemen.

“The Saudi Arabia-led coalition’s unlawful restrictions on imports, coupled with the Huthis’ harmful interference with aid distribution, are preventing life-saving supplies from reaching Yemenis who desperately need them,” Amnesty International’s Middle East Research Director Lynn Maalouf said.

Amnesty also called on both sides to allow “prompt and unhindered” humanitarian access to U.N. agencies and humanitarian organizations. It also urged the U.N. Security Council to “impose targeted sanctions against those responsible for obstructing humanitarian assistance and for committing other violations of international humanitarian law.”

Impoverished Yemen has been devastated and pushed to the brink of famine by a stalemated three-year civil war that has left around two-thirds of Yemen’s population of 27 million relying on aid, and over 8 million at risk of starving. Hodeida is the main entry point for food, humanitarian aid and fuel supplies to Yemen.

Last week, the Saudi-led coalition backing Yemen’s internationally recognized government launched an offensive to retake rebel-held Hodeida. The campaign to seize control of the key port threatens to worsen Yemen’s humanitarian situation and aid groups have voiced fears that a protracted fight could shut down the port and potentially tip millions of people into starvation.