The history of Yemen's 7 years Civil War, who are the players and what is happening?

Written by Maya Pather, Grade 11 & April Stirling, Grade 11

History

The conflict in Yemen initially started in 2011, because of a poor political transition. Former President, Ali Abdullah Saleh, was forced to resign from power because of a civil uprising, forcing him to hand over power to Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi. The new President struggled with many issues after he was given power such as attacks by the jihadists (a separatist movement in the south), unemployment, and lack of food security.

Another prominent issue was the Houthi movement, a group that fought in rebellions and took advantage of Hadi’s struggles by seizing the northern heartland of the Saada Province and the neighbouring cities. The Houthi rebels weren’t stopping there, they wanted more land and control so they surrounded the presidential place, leaving Hadi helpless and powerless. Although Hadi was able to escape this house arrest and take refuge in nearby Saudi Arabia, chaos soon ensued within the country after his departure.

Saudi Arabia was alarmed by the rebel group trying to take power, so with the help of eight other Sunni Arab states, they began an air raid. Saudi Arabia was supported by many western powers such as, the U.K, France, and the U.S, who all support Saudi Arabia logistically.

One reason Saudi Arabia and its allies are able to avoid a public outcry over their intervention in the war in Yemen, is that the number of people killed in the fighting has been vastly understated. The figure is regularly reported as 10,000 dead in three-and-a-half years, a mysteriously low figure given the ferocity of the conflict.

Now a count by a non-partisan group has produced a study demonstrating 56,000 people have been killed in Yemen since early 2016. The number is increasing by more than 2,000 per month as fighting intensifies around the Red Sea port of Hodeidah. It does not include those dying of malnutrition, or diseases such as cholera.

“We estimate the number killed to be 56,000 civilians and combatants between January 2016 and October 2018,” says Andrea Carboni, who researches Yemen for the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), an independent group formerly associated with the University of Sussex that studies conflicts and is focusing attention on the real casualty level. He told me he expects a total of between 70,000 and 80,000 victims, when he completes research into the casualties, hitherto uncounted, who died between the start of the Saudi-led intervention in the Yemen civil war, in March 2015, and the end of that year.

The oft-cited figure of 10,000 dead comes from a UN official speaking only of civilians in early 2017, and has remained static since. This out of date statistic, drawn from Yemen’s patchy and war-damaged health system, has enabled Saudi Arabia and the UAE – who lead a coalition of states strongly backed by the US, UK and France – to ignore or downplay the loss of life.