HUMAN WRONGS WATCH

Human Wrongs Watch

Geneva–Some of the nearly 200,000 Somalis who have sought refuge in Yemen from violence and famine in their own country are now considering going back home due to worsening security in the Arabian Peninsula nation, the United Nations refugee agency reported.

A Somali refugee in Yemen | Credit: UN

“Most new arrivals tell UNHCR (High Commissioner for Refugees) that they were unaware of the situation in Yemen and the conditions they would be facing,” spokesperson Andrej Mahecic said in Geneva on October 21.

Yemen has been torn by fighting between supporters and opponents of president Ali Abdullah Saleh for most of this year, while Somalia’s two decades of factional warfare have been exacerbated by one of the worst famines in memory, which has already killed tens of thousands of people, put 750,000 more at risk of death in the coming months if there is no adequate response, and affected four million others.