Iran Press/ Middle East: Nineteen children were among at least 31 civilians killed in airstrikes on northern Yemen by Saudi airstrikes last week, the United Nations said on Thursday 20 February.
The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is sad to confirm that the recent attack in Al-Jawf, north of Yemen, on February 15, took the lives of 19 children, eight boys and 11 girls, and injured another 18 including nine boys and another nine girls, the UN children's agency said in a statement.
"It was an attack on a civilian populated area where children were in the vicinity," UNICEF regional communications chief Juliette Touma told AFP.
Saturday's airstrikes came after the Yemeni armed forces shot down an aircraft of the Saudi-led coalition.
UNICEF urged the warring sides to put an end to the conflict, adding that the "worrying escalation of violence over the past few weeks is a harsh reminder that children in Yemen continue to carry the heaviest burden of the conflict."
Backed by the United States, the Saudi regime and some of its Arab allies invaded Yemen in 2015 and have enforced a strict blockade of the country by ground, air, and sea.
The Saudi war has affected over seven million children in Yemen who now face a serious threat of famine, according to UNICEF figures.
Over 6,000 children have either been killed or sustained serious injuries since 2015, the UN children’s agency said. The humanitarian situation in the country has also been exacerbated by outbreaks of cholera, polio, and measles.
The US-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, estimates that the war in Yemen has claimed more than 91,000 lives over the past four and a half years.
104/219
Read More:
Saudi artillery shells Yemen's al-Hadidah
Saudi Coalition confirms Tornado pilots captured by Yemeni Armed Forces
Saudi-led coalition warplanes bomb northern Yemen
