Saudi blockade of Yemen still in place, amounts to collective punishment: Aid agency

A major aid agency says Saudi Arabia’s crippling blockade of Yemen is an “illegal collective punishment” of the Yemeni nation, some seven million of whom are on the brink of an appalling famine. 

A major aid agency says Saudi Arabia’s crippling blockade of Yemen is an “illegal collective punishment” of the Yemeni nation, some seven million of whom are on the brink of an appalling famine. 

Jan Egeland, a former UN aid chief who now heads the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), made the remarks on Thursday, a day after the Saudi-led military coalition announced that it would partially lift the siege on the impoverished nation and would let humanitarian supplies in.

Egeland, whose charity group has already helped one million Yemenis, welcomed an announcement by the coalition on removing the blockade of Yemen’s western port city of Hudaydah and the international airport of the capital city of Sana’a, but said, “We only have it in writing now and haven’t seen it happen.”

This came more than two weeks after Saudi Arabia announced that it was shutting down Yemen’s air, sea, and land borders.