Yemen, relief agencies discuss situations of displaced people in Saada

SANA'A, Aug.
31 (Saba)- Public Health and Population Minister Abdul-Karim Rasa'a met on Monday
with
representatives of donors and International relief organizations working in Yemen.
The meeting was devoted to discuss and review reports on the numbers and conditions
of displaced people in the northern Yemeni province of Saada due to the rebellion
of
the al-Houthi group.
They discussed the conditions of displaced people who had fled to relief camps in
the districts of Haradh, Harf Sufyan, Bagim and Saada city.
The Yemeni official and international officials also discussed the needs of the
displaced from relief and medical supplies as well as the role of international
relief organizations
offering the needs of 30000 displaced people in the main camps.
The international representatives confirmed their organizations' willingness to
provide various forms of support of relief food, medicines and tents.
The government has outlined stringent terms for ending the new wave of its
offensive against the rebels in Saada. The government has ordered the rebels to
evacuate all occupied
government offices, hand in weapons and ammunition, and free captured soldiers and
citizens.
It also demanded information as to the whereabouts of a German family of five and a
British engineer kidnapped in June in Saada.
The government was provoked into sending more troops to the north after the rebels
blocked traffic along the strategic highway linking Sana'a to the Saudi border, a
crucial
lifeline for the Yemeni economy.
The government has been engaged in an on-off war with rebels for the best part of
five years. The new offensive is significant escalation in the government's war
against
the rebels, with the state's iron-fist approach.
Since the fighting erupted in 2004, thousands of people, soldiers and insurgents
have been killed in Saada, which lies close to border with Saudi Arabia, after the
rebel
group was founded by rebel leader Hussein al-Houthi.
Hussein, the eldest brother of the current group leader Abdul-Malik, was killed by
the army in September 2004.
The Yemeni government accuses the al-Houthi group of trying to reinstall the rule
of imams, which was toppled by a republican revolution in northern Yemen in 1962.
YA