UN humanitarian chief asks for more funding for Yemen response

UNITED NATIONS, April 15 (Xinhua) -- UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock on Thursday asked for more funding for Yemen, the world's largest humanitarian crisis.

Right now, agencies are able to help only about 9 million people a month, down from nearly 14 million per month a year ago, as a result of lack of funds, he told the Security Council in a briefing.

The pledging conference on March 1 raised 1.7 billion U.S. dollars, less than half of what is needed. Of the pledges that were made, about half have been paid, meaning the UN response plan for Yemen is less than 25 percent funded, he noted.

"So again, as I have said many times before, without more funding, millions of Yemenis will be staring down a death sentence before the year reaches its close. So I again ask donors to disburse any outstanding pledges right away, and to make additional pledges."

Sustained assistance is going to be necessary all through the year to avert the famine and to deal with Yemen's other acute needs. More money for the UN response plan is the fastest, most efficient way to save millions of lives, he said.

Lowcock called for measures to boost the Yemeni economy, including injecting foreign exchange through the Central Bank to strengthen the currency, which is trading near record lows. He also stressed the need to ensure that adequate quantities of commercial imports, particularly fuel, keep entering all the ports.

There is a need for a nationwide cease-fire and the resumption of the political process because the only way to end the crisis in Yemen is to end the war, said Lowcock.

Yemen is seeing a second wave of COVID-19. Confirmed cases have more than doubled in just six weeks, he said.

More people are getting sick, including doctors, nurses and aid workers, although reporting mechanisms capture only a small share of cases. Hospitals and health facilities are increasingly turning people away because they have no more room or they lack supplies, he said.

"The virus is moving much faster than we can keep up. Vaccines won't be enough to suppress the second wave. So we urgently need more resources to scale up treatment, monitoring and other activities that will mitigate the impact of the pandemic."