Saudi warships kill four, including child, in Yemen’s Hajjah

At least four Yemeni civilians, including a child, have lost their lives after the Saudi-led coalition’s warships targeted the impoverished country’s northwestern province of Hajjah.

Yemen’s Arabic-language al-Masirah television network said the aggression, which led to the injury of another child, took place in al-Jurr area in the northern district of Abs on Thursday.

Saudi warplanes launched two air strikes in the same area on early last month, leaving one civilian injured.

On April 8, the Saudi-led coalition claimed it was halting military attacks and suspending hostilities in support of the United Nations’ peace efforts, and to avoid further spread of the new coronavirus in Yemen.

However, shortly after the announcement, the coalition’s warplanes struck positions at several Yemeni regions and the onslaught still goes on.

Saudi Arabia and a number of its regional allies launched the devastating war on Yemen in March 2015 in order to bring former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi back to power and crush the Houthi Ansarullah movement.

The US-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, estimates that the war has claimed more than 100,000 lives over the past five years.

More than half of Yemen’s hospitals and clinics have been destroyed or closed during the war by the Saudi-led coalition, which is supported militarily by the UK, US and other Western nations. 

At least 80 percent of the 28 million-strong population is also reliant on aid to survive in what the United Nations has called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

According to the UN’s top aid official, Mark Lowcock, civilian casualties have risen every month since January.