Saudi Arabia KSA – Alistair Reign News Blog

YEMEN: Interview With Founder of Mona Relief Humanitarian Aid

Question: Describe your background in Yemen. For example, do you have family there? Where are you from? What were you doing before the war began? How old are you?

Answer: I am Fatik Abdullah al-Rodaini, a Yemeni Journalist and humanitarian worker based in Yemen’s capital of Sana’a. I am a 40-year father of six kids and a husband to a great wife that helps me on all my projects. I have a whole family in Sanaa, a mother, sisters and brothers as well. I have a BA degree in mass media from the mass media faculty, Sanaa University.

I am the founder and CEO of Yemen organization for Humanitarian Relief and Development (MONA Relief). The organization was established in May 2015 as a Sanaa-based Non-governmental organization.

Before working as a humanitarian, I worked as a translator at the office of President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi during 2014-2014. Prior to this job, I worked as the editor of the news website of late president Ali Abdullah Saleh at Yemen’s News Agency Saba during 2007-2012. I started to work with Saba in 1996.

Question: How did you begin your relief efforts?

Fatik: I started working as a humanitarian after the Saudi-led coalition launched a bombing campaign in Yemen in March 2015. I could not stay home or watching while my country was in need of all of us. When the humanitarian situation started to deteriorate because of ongoing war and blockade, I decided to do something to help affected people. My humanitarian work has been focused on saving lives of IDPs and most vulnerable people in Amanat Al-Asimah “Sanaa the capital”, Sanaa the governorate, Amran, Saada, Hodeida, Marib, Dhamar, Mahwit and Hajjah.

Question: What do you do each day and week as part of MonaRelief? Where in Yemen do you work?

Fatik: I am the CEO of MonaRelief and have two main tasks, the office task is focused on daily and weekly communications with donors, international and local aid agencies and people that come to my office and ask for help. I also attend meetings of the UN and international organizations to discuss the situation and coordinate activities in Yemen. Moreover, I network with local organizations and support individual aid initiatives.

The field task: I am the leader of my field crews. I visit cities and areas to distribute and supervise the delivery of aid to the needy people. I also assess where, how, why and to whom aid must be given, besides supervising the performance of the field crews in order to guarantee everything is done in a good way.

You can find more information about our work on our website monareliefye.org; our twitter account @monarelief or @monareliefye; Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/monareliefarbaic, and Flickr http://www.flickr.com/monareliefyemen.

Question: What is your mission with MonaRelief? What other organizations do you work with?

Fatik: My mission to help alleviate the humanitarian crisis and contribute to efforts aimed at serving my people.

Question: Is there a story from your work that stays with you? Why?

Fatik: Yes. The story of a mother and her eight blind sons and daughter who fled the unabated battles between the Saudi-backed forces and Houthi-Saleh forces in the Nihem district in the governorate of Sanaa. This mother and her blind kids fled to the capital where they had no supporter until our organization visited and started to help them. They traveled at night from a mountain to another until they arrived in the capital. The mother is the only supporter of her kids. The war was the worst nightmare to them. It destroyed their farm which they used to live on and the house they used to live in. The father is suffering from a mental illness. She is a great woman. She did not give up.

Question: How has the blockade affected your work? Are the goods that make it through actually helping people living in Yemen?

Fatik: The blockade has affected my work largely. It has been preventing my organization from receiving aid cargoes “mostly food, clothes and medicines” and financial aid sent by foreign donors. We have been unable to receive financial aid through our bank accounts because Yemen was sanctioned and money transfers into it suspended.

Question: What do you want people outside of Yemen to know about life on the ground there? What is the international community getting wrong about Yemen?

Fatik: In a few words, foreigners need to know that Yemen is facing the world’s largest humanitarian crisis and that all basic services are on the brink of total collapse. People in Yemen are dying from hunger and disease outbreaks while people outside Yemen either do not know about us or are just watching.

Question: What can or should other countries do to help?

Fatik: Other countries must do their best to end the war here. This is the first thing every one should think about. Then other countries should mobilize efforts to contain the humanitarian catastrophe and disease outbreaks. Well, media in foreign countries should write more about Yemen professionally.

Question: You work in very difficult situations and with topics that are difficult, what keeps you motivated?

Fatik: My country and people need me. I want to keep the smile on children’s faces. I want to save lives of those who have lost their supporters and hope. I can do something for the needy people and this is what keeps me motivated.

Question: Where do you find hope? What does hope mean to you?

Fatik: I find hope in providing more support to those who need it. At the moment, hope is everything.

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Complicit In War Crimes – Canada Is Failing The People of Yemen

The crisis in Yemen continues to worsen as the Saudi-led coalition forces and Houthi rebels blatantly disregard the damage being inflicted on innocent Yemeni civilians. Famine and disease have spread through the country unchecked, due in large part to a Saudi-imposed blockade on air and sea ports that has resulted in a desperate shortage of food, humanitarian aid, and medical supplies.

The United Nations has renewed demands for combatants to allow unconditional humanitarian access to all parts of the country.

Saudi-led coalition allies repeatedly have hindered the movement of aid and commercial goods to the population. Huthi/Saleh (forces in Taiz)… routinely interfere with the work of humanitarians, at times demanding the diversion of aid to themselves or denying aid workers access to populations in need. [01]

The human cost of the two-year-old conflict is horrific. At least 8,000 civilian deaths and 45,000 injuries were reported by the middle of 2017, though it is suspected that the real figures are much higher. A recent draft UN report alleges that the Saudi coalition was responsible for more than 680 child casualties in 2016.

A devastating cholera outbreak, the most recent consequence of the fighting, has thus far afflicted over 500,000 people and resulted in almost 2,000 deaths. This outbreak is being exacerbated, and potentially even strategically exploited, by the coalition forces. Meanwhile, 17 million people are experiencing food insecurity and nearly 15 million lack access to basic healthcare services.

The innocent people of Yemen are trapped within a complex network of different national, regional and international competing vested interests, resulting in violent and deadly outcomes for which they alone suffer. Only bold leadership from the players in this conflict, both home and abroad, can (end the total ambivalence to human tragedy) – indeed it is their moral, and legal, responsibility to do so. [02]

As the situation deteriorates, an effective international response is desperately needed.

To date, there has been a widespread failure on the part of the international community to substantively address the crisis, which is unfolding in plain view and in which combatants are demonstrably violating the rules of international law. Indiscriminate air strikes, imprecise weapons used in residential areas, and the use of cluster munitions are but a few of the atrocities being perpetrated on both sides of the conflict. Significant pressure needs to be put on Saudi Arabia to de-escalate the situation and bring an end to civilian suffering.

The UN Security Council should take prompt action to rejuvenate the political track by passing a long-overdue new resolution under its mandatory Chapter VII authority demanding an immediate ceasefire, unfettered humanitarian access and a return to talks based on the existing UN road map, which requires compromises from both sides.

In such a context of lawlessness and abuse, there is an urgent need for truth, accountability and justice for victims of the conflict.

Given the apparent inadequacies of Saudi Arabia and Yemen-led investigations to date, Amnesty International believes the only way to achieve this is through the establishment of a UN-led independent international investigation to look into alleged violations by all parties. [03]

It is in this context that we must once again highlight the unconscionable decision by the Canadian government to continue moving forward with the $15 billion Saudi arms deal.

Simply put, Canada cannot export weapons to Saudi Arabia without being complicit in the gross violations of human rights being perpetrated by Saudi forces. In addition to Canada taking a more active diplomatic role in resolving the Yemen conflict, it is absolutely critical that this arms deal is cancelled and that Bill-C47 ensures an acceptably high standard for Canadian arms exports moving forward. [04]

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YEMEN: Urgent Aid Needed As Cholera Outbreak Kills Thousands

**Before the Saudi-led coalition war on Yemen in March 2015, the country was already a protracted crisis characterized by widespread poverty, conflict, poor governance and weak rule of law.**

Today, and after almost 27 months of the war on Yemen, the economy is near collapse, public and private services have all but disappeared, and Yemenis have lost most of their livelihoods and depleted most of their saving.

All photos in this video were taken by Mona Relief volunteers.

The war in Yemen has devastated the lives of millions of people in all different sectors and a result of the war health sector was affected badly as the other sectors in the country. According to the UN statistics regarding the health sector there is nearly half of all health facilities are non-functional – An estimated 14.8 million people lack access to basic healthcare, including 8.8 million living in severely under-served areas. Medicine and medical supplies and materials are in chronically short supply.

Not only that but also infectious diseases started appearing everywhere in the country, We have noticed lately that cholera epidemic starting spreading very fast in the country, deteriorating the lives of millions of Yemenis, who started suffering due to the lack of health services in the their country.

Cholera outbreak for first time was confirmed in Yemen in October 2016 in the capital Sana’a but in May 2017 new cases were being diagnosed at a rate three times higher than the initial estimates.

The Cholera outbreak was spreading, with almost one person an hour dying from the water-borne infection according to World Health Organization (WHO) – and a quarter of the dead so far are children along with 5000 new diagnoses a day.

Now the number of acute watery diarrhea (AWD) suspected cholera cases has increased dramatically, and the Cholera outbreak expanded to 22 out of 23 governorates.

According to Yemen Health Ministry’s report about the cholera situation in Yemen from April 27 to July 6, 2017, the total number of suspected cholera cases is 291,554, and half of the sick are children.

The number of deaths is 1678 that have been reported in 95.6% (22 / 23) of Yemen governorates and 86.5% (288/333) of the districts.

According to WHO the total number of confirmed cases of cholera is 391. The four most affected governorates in Yemen are Amanat al-Asimah, Hodeidah, Hajjeh and Amran with 47.4% of reported cases.

The situation is extremely serious as the epidemic threatens almost all Yemeni people if the international community continues to ignore that Yemen is the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

You can also watch the narrated version of this of this report on Mona Relief’s YouTube Channel.

By Fatik al-Rodaini, Mona Relief founder.

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YEMEN: Genocide By Starvation – Even Russia Calls A Spade A Spade!

On the 13th of this month, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova spoke out on the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen, while pointing out that Western apathy and U.S. involvement in Yemen is an hypocrisy of both their values and accusations of war crimes in Aleppo – when they are killing civilians and bombing hospitals in Northern Syria, Iraq and Yemen.

I have to agree with her. The following is her press release.

Once again, we must return to the humanitarian situation in Yemen. The situation there has become even more catastrophic following the latest escalation in combat. These alarming conclusions have been backed up at the briefing by United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Stephen O’ Brien at the UN Security Council on March 10. He painted a shocking picture of the state of affairs, characterising Yemen as the “largest humanitarian crisis in the world.”

Combat between the sides of the conflict in Yemen, with direct involvement by the Saudi-led coalition,

have already killed at least 7,500 people since March 2015, according to the most conservative estimates,
with more than 40,000 wounded.
Around 19 million people are in need of humanitarian aid.
More than 7 million people, mostly children, are malnourished.
Two million Yemenis have been internally displaced, 62,000 of them in just the last six weeks.
Many of these people are unable to find shelter and are living in the open.
This does not include the tens of thousands of refugees.
More than 48,000 people from the coastal town of Mocha have fled in just the last two months since coalition forces began their offensive.

Coalition aircraft caused another bloody episode when, on March 10, they were reported to have bombed a market in the town of Khokha, killing dozens and wounding dozens more.

Plans to launch an offensive against Yemen’s biggest port, Hodeida, are especially worrying. Combat in this region will not only cause mass flight of the population, but will essentially cut the capital, Sana’a, off from food and humanitarian aid supply routes. There is no need to say what disastrous consequences this would have.

Airstrikes continue causing tremendous damage to Yemen’s civilian infrastructure. Schools, hospitals and transport facilities have been destroyed. Arbitrary air blockades and obstacles to shipping make it extremely difficult to get food and fuel supplies into the country. Medicines are in acutely short supply, which means that many Yemenis are dying of what are curable diseases today. The north of the country is in a catastrophic situation, with no cash supply. Public sector workers have not been paid in more than six months.

Terrorists from ISIS and Al-Qaeda are capitalising on this chaos, bolstering their strongholds in Yemen, mostly in the south of the country, and even further complicating the humanitarian situation.

But Western media and NGOs pay little attention to this situation, and indeed pass it over in silence. The West shows no interest in it within its various international forums, in strong contrast to its hyper-active position on Syria.

The Russian Embassy in Sana’a is making active efforts to facilitate the work of the UN humanitarian team in Yemen, headed by Jamie McGoldrick. It was with our effort that a secretariat was set up to ensure coordination between the UN personnel and the de-facto authorities in the capital, above all in the interests of ensuring the population’s unhindered access to humanitarian aid.

We call for an immediate cessation of all use of force, no matter the justifications for combat. It is our firm belief that the Yemeni conflict cannot be resolved by military means. The parties must return to the negotiating table, with the aid of UN Special Envoy Ismail Ahmed, with the aim of reaching a lasting ceasefire and finding a political solution to the conflict. [01]

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YEMEN: Saudis Number One Sex Offenders Prey On Impoverished Children

According to a recent U.S. Human Rights Report, Yemeni children were subjected to sex trafficking within the country and in Saudi Arabia. Girls as young as 15 years old were exploited for commercial sex in hotels and clubs in Governorates of Sana’a, Aden, and Taiz, before the Saudi attacks began in 2015.

Prior to the conflict, most child sex tourists in Yemen were from Saudi Arabia, with a smaller number originating from other Gulf nations, including the United Arab Emirates.

Some Saudi men used legally contracted “temporary marriages” for the purpose of sexually exploiting Yemeni girls – some reportedly as young as 10 years old, and some of whom were later abandoned on the streets of Saudi Arabia.

Somali prostitutes gather in a slum house in the southern Yemeni port city of Aden February 7, 2010. REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah — Somali prostitutes gather in a slum house in the southern Yemeni port city of Aden, *February 7, 2010*. (REUTERS/ Khaled Abdullah).

Civil society organizations reported that, as a result of the dire economic situation in Yemen, particularly in the north, sex trafficking of Yemeni children increased over the past several years. In addition, some sources reported the practice of chattel slavery in which human beings are traded as property continues in Yemen.

While no official statistics exist detailing this practice, a 2014 study by a human rights organization documented 190 cases of slavery in three directorates of Hajjah governorate. Sources report there could be several hundred other men, women, and children sold or inherited as slaves in al-Hodeida and al-Mahwit governorates.

Prior to its departure, the Yemeni government and international NGOs estimated there were approximately 1.7 million child laborers under the age of 14 in Yemen, some of whom are subjected to forced labor. Since the escalation of armed conflict in March 2015, human rights organizations reported all parties to the conflict have increased their use of child soldiers.

Yemeni and Saudi gangs transported African children to Saudi Arabia for the purpose of exploitation. Traffickers abused and abandoned in Yemen some refugees and migrants from the Horn of Africa who voluntarily transited Yemen en route to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. In past years, multiple NGOs reported criminal smuggling groups had built a large number of “camps” near the Yemeni-Saudi border city of Haradh, where migrants hoping to reach Saudi Arabia were held for extortion and ransom.

During the previous reporting period, the government enacted a regulation requiring MOI approval for Yemenis to marry foreigners, in an effort to reduce sex tourism among foreigners, particularly Saudis and Emiratis who “temporarily” married young Yemeni women; however, they often did this in exchange for bribes, and officials continued to provide such approval.

Further, the government (under Hadi) did not provide anti-trafficking training to its diplomatic personnel and did not make efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts, forced labor, or address the problem of sex tourism more broadly. In addition, it did not provide anti-trafficking training to troops prior to their deployment abroad as part of international peacekeeping missions. Yemen is not a party to the 2000 UN TIP Protocol. [01]

Watch rare films and TV series in our Documentaries section.

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(18+) Documentary: VICE – The Rise Of Terror

This documentary explores deep into the minds and activities of what motivates, and what makes this violent, radicalized group appeal to its followers.

The crew visits several Middle East, South Asia and Africa locations affected by terror inflicted by the religious militants enforcing the law of Saudi Arabia’s state religion – Wahhabism.

Watch more rare films in our Documentaries section.