“Several people were killed and dozens were injured when airstrikes hit Sana’a city,” said Jens Laerke, Spokesperson for the humanitarian affairs coordination office (OCHA).
Echoing a statement on the atrocity by Lise Grande, UN Resident Coordinator in Yemen, Mr Laerke noted that “preliminary reports we have last night indicate that five children had died and 16 more were wounded. Additional casualties including health workers have been recorded.”
The OCHA Spokesperson’s comments follow an appeal by United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to the UN Security Council on Wednesday to save the lives of 15 million children across the war-torn country.
More than four years of fighting have left at least 7,300 children killed or seriously injured, Henrietta Fore, head of the UN Children’s Fund, told the Council’s 15 members, noting that as these were officially verified figures, the true numbers “are no doubt higher”.
Also in Geneva, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, appealed for combatants to respect the protection of civilians and respect their obligations under international humanitarian law.
“Refugees are known to be among those injured and affected”, said spokesperson Andrej Mahecic. “A Somali refugee woman and her daughter are among those now receiving critical treatment in a hospital”, he explained, adding that there are more than 275,000 refugees, asylum seekers and migrants in the country, and more than nine in 10 are from the Horn of Africa state.
Amid ongoing insecurity in Yemen, millions remain on the brink of starvation, as access problems hinder the work of humanitarians to deliver food, fuel and medicines.
The majority of these supplies are imported via the country’s embattled Red Sea ports of Hudaydah, Saleef and Ras Issa, from where Houthi forces redeployed earlier this week under the UN-led agreement sealed last December, UN Special Envoy Martin Griffiths told the Security Council on Wednesday.
“This progress will allow the United Nations to play the leading role given to it in supporting the Yemen Red Sea Ports Corporation in management and inspections at the ports, including enhanced monitoring by the UN Verification and Inspection Mechanism,” Mr. Griffiths said.