Red Cross employee killed in Yemen’s Taiz

By Murad Erifi

SANAA

A Red Cross employee was shot dead in southwestern Yemen on Saturday, according to a local government official.

Unidentified gunmen opened fire on a Red Cross vehicle in Milat neighborhood, west of Taiz province, killing a Lebanese member of the organization, the official said on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to speak to media.

He said the attackers had fled the scene.

There was no claim of responsibility for the attack.

The Red Cross has yet to confirm the killing.

Held by government forces, Taiz has been under a siege imposed by Houthi rebels since 2015.

Yemen has been racked by violence since 2014, when Houthi rebels overran much of the country. The conflict escalated in 2015 when Saudi Arabia and its allies launched a massive air campaign aimed at rolling back Houthi gains.

The ongoing violence has devastated basic services, including water and sanitation systems, prompting the UN to describe the situation in Yemen as one of “the world’s worst humanitarian disasters in modern times”.