International Tweetstorm This Coming Saturday to End the Saudi Siege on Yemen #EndYemenSiege
YemenExtra
M.A.
The Committee that is responsible for organizing the #EndYemenSiege(EYS) international campaign, urged the people all around the world to take part in this popular media campaign and help in terminating the comprehensive siege on Yemen, Sanaa International Airport, in particular, that will be launched tomorrow Saturday on Twitter.
In a statement, the Committee stressed the importance of participation in this humanitarian media campaign through all social networking sites.
In addition, the statement pointed out that the popular media campaign aims to convey the injustice and suffering of the Yemeni people as a result of the embargo imposed on Sana’a International Airport and its continued closure of civilian flights.
The Committee said, “We seek through this campaign to save the lives of patients and delivery of medication and the return of the stranded to their homeland.” Calling for vast nationwide participation in the campaign on the Twitter social app, which will start at 8 pm Saturday (Sanaa zone), at noon EST, January 5, 2019, using the hashtag: #EndYemenSiege.
A three-year shutdown of Sanaa international airport by the Saudi-led coalition has resulted in a major impact in increasing the death toll during the war because critical conditions cannot be treated in the impoverished state due to the lack of advanced doctors and medical equipment.
The aggressive coalition claims that the Ansarullah movement (Houthis) are using the airport to smuggle weapons. Houthis say they are willing to let the UN supervise the airport and direct what, who goes in and out of the airport; however, the Saudi-led aggression continued to hinder this case, conditioning that all flights must be investigated in Aden, a southern Yemeni province who the UAE is taking control of at the moment, including its airport.
Houthis opposed the condition, saying that the airport should work under international standards.
During the last consultations held in Sweden regarding Yemen peace talks under the auspices of the UN, Sanaa delegation said it accepts the landing and the investigation of flights before reaching their destination in Egypt or Jordan, stating that Aden is under the occupation of the UAE, including its port, and that passengers might be harassed, beaten or taken as hostages if going to Aden. Saudi backed government rejected the deal and demanded that the opening will happen merely if flights go to Aden first for inquiring the planes.
According to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), humanitarian organization said that the airport has been hit with an average of one bomb every fortnight, in the three years since it has been shut to all commercial traffic.
According to the Yemen data project, more than Fifty-six coalition airstrikes have been dropped on the airport complex, which resulted in the damage of its critical infrastructure and threatening the safety of surrounding communities.
“An airport should be a safe and functioning piece of civilian infrastructure, allowing people to come and go freely,” said Johan Mooij, Country Director for CARE in Yemen. “Instead, the airport in Sana’a has become a symbol of aggression and oppression for a very large population.”
On August 2017, Yemen’s Sanaa ministry said 10,000 Yemenis have died from health conditions for which they were seeking medical treatment abroad. Since then, there has not been a clear toll of the deaths, but they have surely risen.
The war, imposed Saudi siege on Yemen has resulted in the country to be looked at as the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophe since world war II, and as the UN warned, Yemen could be facing the worst famine in 100 years if airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition are not halted.
An estimate of 70,000 Yemenis have been killed since the beginning of the Saudi military campaign in Yemen in 2015, according to humanitarian organizations.