GENEVA, SWITZERLAND: King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre (KSrelief) recently participated in a seminar entitled “Supporting the Human Rights in Yemen”, the event was held on the margins of 41st Session of the Human Rights Council.

Attendees included GCC Ambassadors, a number of representatives from Arab and foreign diplomatic missions in Geneva, media outlets, and others interested in global humanitarian work. 

The Head of KSrelief’s Health and Environmental Aid Department, Dr. Abdullah Al Moallem, spoke at the seminar about the wide range of humanitarian assistance being provided by KSrelief around the world, particularly in Yemen. He added that more than 4 million women and 6 million children in Yemen were suffering from difficult humanitarian conditions caused by ongoing Houthi militia violations of international human rights laws. 

Dr. Al Moallem emphasized the center’s ongoing efforts to empower women in Yemen by providing vocational training programs designed to meet the needs of local labor markets; these programs, he added, strengthened the trainees’ financial independence and helped them to support their families. He also spoke about the challenges to education in Yemen caused by Houthi militias’ destroying or taking over schools for their own militia purposes. Many Yemeni children, he said, are forced to drop out of school, despite the fact that every child is entitled to a basic education. Another reason for disruption in education is that the salaries of more than two-thirds of all teachers in Yemen have been stopped or delayed. KSrelief, he asserted, has funded and implemented more than 9 education projects aimed at reconstructing and reequipping damaged schools and training teachers. 

Dr. Al Moallem went on to explain that KSrelief had distributed food baskets in all areas of Yemen, improving food security throughout the country. The center also distributed Iftar meals during the holy month of Ramadan, and hundreds of tons of dates across 10 governorates, in cooperation with local humanitarian organizations. 

KSrelief also implemented a livelihoods improvement project in Yemen, which included the following three humanitarian sectors: cash-for-work, agriculture and fishing, and training for female breadwinners and youth empowerment.  

Regarding Yemen’s health sector, Dr. Al Moallem highlighted some of the comprehensive projects KSrelief had implemented in the country. For example, KSrelief supported World Health Organization (WHO) programs to implement life-saving cholera epidemic responses around Yemen as part of the part of the Yemen Comprehensive Humanitarian Operations (YCHO). The center also established specialized health centers and supported hospitals with medicines, medical solutions and equipment, and helped to implement vaccination campaigns for children. Other medical sector activities included projects to provide health care services for mothers and children, implement health awareness education programs, and launch preventive health care measures. Mobile nutrition clinics were also set up to serve Yemeni IDPs. All of these projects contributed to the overall improvement of Yemen’s medical sector across all governorates. 

In the area of community support, KSrelief implemented a number of initiatives. The Child Soldiers Rehabilitation Program provides psychological and practical support to former child soldiers and other children severely affected by the ongoing conflict in Yemen. The “You Are Not Alone” project gives protection and support to orphans, providing them with housing, education, psychological services, health care and food to help them to reintegrate into their communities and to succeed in the future. 

Dr. Al Moallem also mentioned a few of the qualitative projects implemented in Yemen, such as the Artificial Limbs Centers in Ma’rib and Aden, and the MASAM project for demining. The Saudi Village for Yemeni refugees in Djibouti was also established, and provides 300 housing units, a school and a mosque for Yemeni refugees.