The Australian Government has been called on to disclose all defence deals it has made with Saudi Arabia, as the humanitarian crisis in Yemen worsens.

Key points: Amnesty International wants Australia to reveal its defence deals with Saudi Arabia

Amnesty International wants Australia to reveal its defence deals with Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia is blockading Yemen's main port, preventing food from reaching much of the population

Saudi Arabia is blockading Yemen's main port, preventing food from reaching much of the population The UN says seven million people in Yemen are on the brink of starvation

Amnesty International said Australia "is legally obliged" to make sure any defence sales are not being used to commit human rights violations in Yemen.

Saudi Arabia is blockading Yemen's main port, preventing food from reaching about 75 per cent of the population.

The UN says 7 million people in Yemen are already on the brink of starvation and the country could face the worst famine "in decades" if food aid remains blocked.

"In the past 12 months the Australian Department of Defence has approved four different military licences to Saudi Arabia," Amnesty International's Rasha Mohamed told 7.30.

"We're calling on Australia to fully disclose all transfer details and deals they've made with the Saudi-led coalition, and make public what are the end user agreements."

The Department of Defence routinely refuses to reveal what those licenses are for.

"We don't disclose the particular types of equipment, mainly from a commercial-in-confidence perspective," Defence associate secretary Rebecca Skinner said during Senate estimates in October.

"Has the department assessed whether any previously supplied Australian equipment has been used by the Saudi-led coalition in unlawful attacks on Yemen?" Senator Peter Whish-Wilson asked.

"We are unaware of any equipment or things they have received — export permits — being used in such a way," Ms Skinner said.

Sorry, this video has expired Defence Minister grilled over joint RAN/Saudi Arabia exercise

Last week, Defence Minister Marise Payne was questioned in Parliament over an Australian Navy training exercise with the Saudi Navy in the Red Sea in August, which has been criticised by aid and human rights groups and the Australian Defence Association.

The Saudi-led coalition war effort has been supported by the US and the UK. Both have also made billions selling the kingdom arms.

Today at a lunch in Canberra, the chairman of leading global weapons makers BAE, Sir Roger Carr, defended the sales when questioned by the ABC.

"That part of the world is complicated. It is easy to form a remote judgement but when under threat one has to protect oneself and one's people," Sir Roger said when questioned over the ethics of sales amid the Yemen conflict.

Sailors from the Royal Australian Navy and the Royal Saudi Navy during a joint exercise in August 2017. ( Facebook )



'Yemen is in crisis'

The International Committee for the Red Cross announced today five cities in Yemen had now run out of clean water because the blockade had stopped fuel being imported to power pumping stations.

The UN has told 7.30 hospital generators in Yemen could be out of fuel in a matter of weeks.

"We are sitting at probably two to three weeks' supply of fuel, for water truck delivery, for the pumping of clean water to prevent cholera, for the hospitals to continue to treat people," the UN's aid coordinator for Yemen, Jamie McGoldrick, said.

"And if it runs out then the tragedy just gets exacerbated to a level that we can't even imagine what it looks like."

A doctor at Al-Sabeen Hospital in the capital Saana told 7.30 there were already signs of an impending diphtheria crisis.

A child suffering from diphtheria is treated in a Sanaa hospital. ( ABC News: Moohialdin Fuad )

"We have a shortage and lack of the medicine and the anti-toxin due to the blockade, now we cannot find this medicine. So the mortality will increase and the spread of the disease will increase," Dr Najla Al-Sonboli said.

She said 90 per cent of children being admitted to the hospital were suffering malnutrition.

"It really is 21 million people who need aid or protection to survive," said Suze Van Meegan, an Australian aid worker who has been working in Yemen for the Norwegian Refugee Council.

"We don't know what it will take to get people to pay attention to Yemen. We feel that for two-and-a-half years we've been saying, 'The situation's getting worse, the situation's getting worse, there's an impending crisis in Yemen'. It's no longer impending. Yemen is in crisis."

Why the blockade happened

A child is carried from the site of a Saudi-led air strike that killed eight of her family members in Sanaa, Yemen, in August 2017. ( Reuters: Khaled Abdullah )

For nearly three years Saudi Arabia and its allies have been fighting Iran-aligned opposition rebels in Yemen called the Houthis.

The allies are trying to restore the Government of President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi, who was overthrown by the Houthis.

The Houthis control the Yemeni capital Sanaa and a large swathe of the country.

More than 20 million people live under their control.

For years the Saudis and their allies have been restricting access to Houthis areas, closing Yemen's main airport last August and preventing aid and food shipments into the country.

People queue for water in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa. ( ABC News: Moohialdin Fuad )

Two weeks ago, Houthis rebels fired a ballistic missile towards Riyadh airport in Saudi Arabia.

The Saudi coalition retaliated, closing Yemen's main port and stopping all UN humanitarian flights in and out of the country.

Saudi Arabia said the tight new measures were to stop Iran smuggling weapons to the rebels.

But the UN said safeguards were already in place before the blockade.

"There is a UN mechanism there that does the job of looking at humanitarian cargoes. And then there is the Saudi-led coalition that has their mechanism of looking at other cargos," the UN's Jamie McGoldrick told the ABC.

"The UN inspection mechanism which has been up and running for over a year and there hasn't been any incidents as far as I gather."