0 Shares 0



0

0







The United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) on Tuesday warned against attacks on water systems in Yemen, reported sources.

An attack, carried out this week on the Nushour water facility in Yemen’s northwestern city of Sa’dah, cut off 10,500 people, including over 5,000 children, from safe drinking water, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said.

''A large water facility in Sa'ada, northwest of the country, came under attack this week. This is the third such attack on the same facility. More than half of the project is now damaged, cutting off 10,500 people from safe drinking water,'' Unicef said in a statement.

The organization said it censured in the strongest terms yet another attack on vital and lifesaving water systems in Yemen.

''Continuous attacks on water systems in Yemen are cutting off children and their families from water; increasing the likelihood of water-borne diseases spreading in the war-torn country,'' the organization also said.

According to the report, cutting off children and their families from safe drinking water increases the spread of water-borne diseases in the country, as well as the number of deaths among the country’s civilians.

In early January last year, a series of explosions heavily damaged a water desalination plant near the Yemeni port city of Al-Mokha. In a single act, more than a million people in nearby Taiz were cut off from their only reliable water source.

Several years on, the death toll stands at over 10,000. Far more severe, however, is the humanitarian crisis caused by destruction of infrastructure and economic blockades. A substantial portion of Yemeni infrastructure has been bombed, mostly by Saudi Arabian and UAE jets. Key bridges, viaducts, dams and water treatment plants have all been destroyed in the fighting, causing water scarcity to reach unprecedented levels.

*(Image credit: Asmaa Waguih/ Felton Davis/ flickr)