Halo Trust demining workers still trapped by Houthi siege in Taiz

Halo Trust demining personnel are still confined by the Houthi siege in Taiz, Yemen, the charity disclosed on Wednesday. The Houthis have encircled Taiz, a city under government control, as they vie for dominance. The siege has effectively barred the sole mountain route linking the city to Yemen's interim capital, Aden, according to the trust.

Taiz is rife with mine contamination; all supply routes into and out of the city are severed. Humanitarian organizations have been sounding the alarm on dwindling food, water, medicine, and fuel supplies in the city. One Halo Trust employee is stranded outside Taiz, unable to reunite with her children. "Behind this siege are real people facing impossible choices.

Our staff are trapped in Taiz, separated from their families and uncertain when they’ll see their loved ones again," said Mara van der Kamp, Halo Trust's Yemen programme manager. "The longer this siege continues, the greater the suffering for civilians who have nowhere safe to turn." On Wednesday, the Houthis asserted a ballistic missile strike on a Saudi operations room in Aden, Yemen's de facto capital, though Saudi Arabia has not yet confirmed the attack.

Last Thursday, Houthi missiles targeted the Presidential Palace in Aden, resulting in five deaths. On Monday, the government confirmed at least 73 fatalities following a Houthi strike on a military training camp in Shabwa. Saudi Arabia entered Yemen's civil war in 2015, supporting the government against the Houthis, who had seized Sanaa, fearing Iranian influence and predicting chaos on its borders.

In 2022, the UN brokered a truce between the warring parties, maintaining a fragile peace until this year. Saudi Arabia has resumed its military campaign in Yemen to bolster the internationally recognized government, aiming to counteract the Houthis' swift gains last month, as they advanced along the Red Sea coast to the crucial Bab Al Mandeb strait.

The EU has called on the Houthis to lift their siege of Taiz, while the Yemeni government has appealed to the UN for urgent action to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe. At least 600,000 people in Taiz rely on aid, including over 200,000 children. More than 200,000 people have been displaced from their homes since the recent fighting, according to the UN's International Organisation for Migration.