OMM Redaksiyası
The UN has urged the Houthis to halt their military offensive in Yemen’s Taiz province, warning that intensified fighting poses grave risks to civilians.
“I am alarmed by developments in Taiz governorate, where fighting has significantly intensified,” UN Special Envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg said in a statement.
Grundberg said his office had received deeply troubling reports of casualties, damage to infrastructure and road closures that were affecting people’s ability to leave the area.
Taiz receiving people displaced by fighting
Taiz, Yemen’s third-largest city, is in a province currently hosting the majority of people newly displaced by recent fighting elsewhere in the country, according to Grundberg.
“Civilians and civilian infrastructure must be protected. Every effort must be made to prevent further harm and ensure safe and unhindered access to people in need,” he said.
The envoy reiterated his call for the Houthis to stop their offensive. He said he remained in close contact with the Yemeni government and the group to contain the situation and ensure civilians could move freely.
Renewed escalation displaces thousands
Fighting between Yemeni government forces and the Houthis has intensified since early July, in the most significant escalation since the relative calm that followed a UN-brokered truce in April 2022.
Nearly 147,000 people were displaced across Yemen between Sept. 1 and 18 amid the renewed fighting, with more than 80,000 arriving in Taiz, according to Yemeni government figures.
Yemen has been engulfed in conflict since the Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa, and several provinces in 2014. A Saudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 in support of the internationally recognized government.
