Text size | | |

UNHCR distributes aid from UAE to refugees in Yemen

News Stories, 3 September 2009

A Somali refugee holds some of the aid he received at Kharaz camp.

ADEN, Yemen, September 3 (UNHCR) – UNHCR staff have helped distribute pasta, sugar and dates to thousands of mainly Somali refugees in Yemen's Kharaz Camp thanks to the generosity of the Red Crescent Society of the United Arab Emirates and the president of the Gulf federation.

The food was donated to help the refugees as they marked the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims must not eat during daylight hours. Staff from the UNHCR and the Society for Humanitarian Solidarity, a partner agency, handed out the food on Monday to 2,800 families in Kharaz and 800 needy Yemeni families in nearby villages – a total of about 18,000 people.

Excited children chased the trucks laden with food as they toured the camp and surrounding area, which is located some 150 kilometres west of the port city of Aden. "Every year we long for Ramadan to come," said 30-year-old Fatima, a Somali whose six-year-old son followed the food distributors. "We feel that Ramadan has started as soon as the truck stops by our door."

The Red Crescent Society of the United Arab Emirates has donated food to the refugees in Kharaz camp for the past five years. "As human beings and Muslims we are committed to solidarity," said Manaf Yassin, head of the Red Crescent's office in Aden.

Leila Nassif, head of the UNHCR office in Aden, said the donation by the Red Crescent and a federation headed by United Arab Emirates President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan was further proof "of the extreme generosity of Muslims and Muslim countries towards people in need."

Yemen is one of the poorest countries in the Middle East, with scarce resources and limited employment opportunities. Yet, it hosts some 140,000 refugees and grants refugee status to all Somalis entering the Yemen. Some 11,000 live in Kharaz camp, located in a remote and desolate area of Yemen's Lahaj region.

UNHCR and its partners run a number of projects to meet their basic needs as well as to provide essential services, including food, shelter, medical care, water and sanitation, and education. Nevertheless, despite the generosity of donors and the efforts of the government, more resources are needed.

"Additional funds would allow us to expand income-generation activities in the camp, invest in small-scale agricultural projects and offer more opportunities for self reliance," said Nassif, while adding: "The involvement of the international community as a whole is needed."

By Rocco Nuri in Aden, Yemen

• DONATE NOW •

Browse by country

• GET INVOLVED • • STAY INFORMED •

UNHCR country pages

Yemen Operation Profile 2012

Yemen's National Dialogue: IDPs' Voices and Views

UNHCR Yemen Fact Sheet

UNHCR Somalia Fact Sheet

New Arrivals in Yemen - Comparison 2010-2013

Somalia Emergency: Urgent Appeal

Widespread malnutrition among Somali refugees requires immediate action.

Donate to this crisis

Crisis in Horn of Africa

Tens of thousands of Somalis are fleeing conflict and drought into Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya.

Yemeni Province Starts Rebuilding as 100,000 Displaced Return

Life is slowly returning to normal in urban and rural areas of the southern Yemeni province of Abyan, where fighting between government forces and rebels caused major population displacements in 2011 and 2012.

But since last July, as hostilities subsided and security began to improve, more than 100,000 internally displaced people (IDP) have returned to their homes in the province, or governorate. Most spent more than a year in temporary shelters in neighbouring provinces such as Aden and Lahj.

Today, laughing children once more play without fear in the streets of towns like the Abyan capital, Zinjibar, and shops are reopening. But the damage caused by the conflict is visible in many areas and the IDPs have returned to find a lack of basic services and livelihood opportunities as well as lingering insecurity in some areas.

There is frustration about the devastation, which has also affected electricity and water supplies, but most returnees are hopeful about the future and believe reconstruction will soon follow. UNHCR has been providing life-saving assistance since the IDP crisis first began in 2011, and is now helping with the returns.

Amira Al Sharif, a Yemeni photojournalist, visited Abyan recently to document life for the returnees.

Yemeni Province Starts Rebuilding as 100,000 Displaced Return

Somalia's Hawa Aden Mohamed wins Nansen Refugee Award

Hawa Aden Mohamed, a former refugee whose visionary work has transformed the lives of thousands of displaced Somali women and girls, is the winner of the 2012 Nansen Refugee Award. Widely known as "Mama" Hawa, she is the founder and director of an ambitious education programme in Galkayo, Somalia, that helps women and girls secure their rights, develop vital skills and play a more active role in society. View a slideshow of Mama Hawa's work at the Galkayo Education Centre for Peace and Development, which offers literacy courses and vocational training as well as food and other forms of humanitarian relief to internally displaced people [IDP].

Somalia's Hawa Aden Mohamed wins Nansen Refugee Award

Photo Essay: Dollo Ado, a Year After the Somalia Famine

In mid-2011, Dollo Ado was at the heart of a refugee crisis as a wave of Somalis facing violence and starvation at home trekked through the desert to seek safety in the small, remote border town in eastern Ethiopia. Many arrived exhausted, sick and emaciated, often carrying weak or dying children.

To deal with the mass influx, UNHCR and the Ethiopian government built three new refugee camps. The agency and its partners also set up critical nutrition programmes in the camps. Large-scale water, sanitation and hygiene programmes, combined with mass vaccinations and other public health measures, saved numerous lives.

One year on, the malnutrition rates among children have begun to stabilize. The number of new arrivals, although steady due to continued violence and poor rains, has dwindled and many people have moved from tents into semi-permanent housing. UNHCR's main focus is to improve lives in the camp by launching livelihood programmes and environmental projects for refugees and the host communities.

Today, the Dollo Ado area hosts five camps, with a total population of nearly 170,000 refugees. Several hundred new refugees arrive from Somalia every week. While the population of the newest camp, Buramino, is reaching 30,000, UNHCR and the government have agreed on the location for a sixth camp.