Saudi Arabia and the UAE signed agreements yesterday to combat the growing humanitarian disaster in Yemen. The agreements aimed at tackling the famine and disease outbreak were signed with UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) during a meeting in Riyadh.
The famine which has resulted from the ongoing war between Saudi Arabia and the Iran backed Houthi rebels, is now estimated to have killed over 100,000 children and an unknown amount of adults, has also resulted in a large scale cholera outbreak across the nation. There are currently more than 300,000 suspected cholera cases across the country, according to UNICEF, only two years after the country was gripped by the world’s largest cholera outbreak.
In a press conference following the meeting, Lowcock, the under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, thanked Saudi Arabia and the UAE for their support in tackling what is now the largest scale humanitarian disaster in the world. Lowcock went on to add that the two countries offered around $1 billion at a UN pledging conference in Geneva in February.
