CAIRO – The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has begun distributions of food to around 340,000 people in eight of the worst-affected areas of the southern Yemeni port city of Aden.
WFP partners are distributing two-month food rations in Crater, Dar Saad, Tawwahi, Khor Maksar, Muala, Mansoura, Buraiqah and Sheikh Othman districts – all areas but one (Mansoura) had not been reached since April because of conflict. The food includes wheat flour, pulses and cooking oil.
“We are challenging the odds to reach tens of thousands of people who would go hungry without food assistance,” said Muhannad Hadi, WFP Regional Director for the Middle East, North Africa, Eastern Europe and Central Asia. “We are working to overcome insecurity, checkpoints and many other hurdles in Yemen to reach desperate families unable to feed their children.”
Three WFP-chartered ships delivered food assistance to the port of Aden last week. MV Han Zhi, MV Amsterdam and the smaller Sikka Star dhow docked in Aden’s oil port of Al-Buraiqa carrying a total of 6,800 metric tons of food – enough to provide emergency assistance for some 400,000 people for a month..
