Hunger surges to record levels in Yemen: UN

Malnutrition in conflict-hit Yemen has reached record levels, narrowing the window of opportunity to prevent a famine, the UN has said, as the coronavirus and funding shortfalls threaten a humanitarian perfect storm. 

The number of people facing the second highest level of food insecurity in Yemen is set to increase from 3.6 million people to 5 million in the first half of 2021, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warned on Thursday.

Yemen, which since 2014 has been gripped by a war between Iran-backed Huthi rebels and a beleaguered government supported by a Saudi-led military coalition, faces the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

"Yemen is on the brink of famine and we must not turn our backs on the millions of families who are now in desperate need," said WFP executive director David Beasley.

The UN warned in July that nearly one in nine people in the world are going hungry, with the novel coronavirus pandemic and climate-related shocks exacerbating already worsening trends this year.

In Yemen's children's wards, the evidence of the crisis is clear, with skeletal children crying weakly as anxious families hover over them.

Before the war erupted, Yemen was already the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula, and with its economy now in tatters, some 80 percent of the population depends on aid to survive.