UN: 10,000 displaced as clashes escalate over key Yemen city
ABC News
The U.N. migration agency says fighting over the key Yemeni city of Marib last month displaced around 10,000 people
ABOARD GEO BARENTS -- Fighting over the key Yemeni city of Marib has displaced around 10,000 people in the past month, the U.N. migration agency said Thursday. The clashes escalated as Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels intensified their push to take the provincial capital from government forces.
Yemen has been convulsed by civil war since 2014, when the Houthis captured the capital, Sanaa, and forced the country’s president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, and the internationally recognized government to flee to the south, and then later to Saudi Arabia.
The International Organization for Migration said the newly displaced — the highest monthly tally recorded so far this year — bring to around 170,000 the number of people who have fled fighting in and around the city of Marib and the surrounding province, also called Marib, as well as two nearby provinces, since the beginning of 2020. The tally was recoded in six of Marib province’s 14 districts, the IOM said.
After seizing control of serval districts and cities in nearby provinces in 2020, the Houthis began their march on Marib in February, with the aim of capturing the city to complete their control over northern Yemen.