UNHCR says it has allocated $2 million for Yemen’s latest displacement wave
Yemen Herald News 
ADEN, Yemen — The UN refugee agency has allocated $2 million to respond to Yemen’s latest wave of displacement, its acting representative in the country said on Sunday.
Armen Yedgarian gave the figure at a meeting in Aden with Mohammed al-Faqmi, the minister of planning and international cooperation.
Yedgarian said UNHCR was preparing to deliver shelter assistance, according to Saba, the government’s news agency.
The two discussed urgent shelter and relief needs, Saba said. They also went over coordination with local authorities and humanitarian partners.
The account of the meeting rests on Saba. Yemen Monitor and Anadolu Agency both carried it, each attributing the account to Saba. No independent confirmation of the allocation has been published, and Yemen Herald could not verify the figure.
Saba rendered the official’s first name as Arman. Anadolu Agency and Yemen Monitor gave it as Armen. The UN country team in Yemen lists Marin Din Kajdomcaj as UNHCR representative; Yedgarian has been described elsewhere as acting representative.
Saba attributed the displacement to what it called the latest escalation by the Houthi militia. The Houthis describe their west coast operations in different terms.
Yemen Monitor said the talks covered tents and shelter requirements for displaced people spread across several governorates.
It said the two sides also discussed coordination between official and humanitarian bodies, and how emergency interventions should be defined.
Al-Faqmi met the UN Population Fund’s resident representative, Francesco Galtieri, the same day. That meeting reviewed ongoing programmes and humanitarian needs, Saba said.
Galtieri set out UNFPA work in reproductive health, prevention of gender-based violence, youth empowerment, population data and rapid response.
He also raised preparations for the agency’s 2027-2029 country programme. A country programme sets a UN agency’s priorities and funding framework for a multi-year period.
The meetings follow three weeks of fighting on Yemen’s west coast. Yemen Monitor said Houthi forces have taken six districts across Taiz and Hudaydah governorates.
Hudaydah and Taiz sit on Yemen’s Red Sea coast, north and south of the stretch of shoreline where the fighting has run.
The heaviest clashes have been in the Kahboub mountains and the al-Mudaraba and al-Waziyah districts, Asharq Al-Awsat reported, citing local and military sources.
The group is trying to consolidate newly seized positions and secure its rear lines in mountain ranges overlooking the western coast and the shipping lane, according to that report.
Estimates of how many people have moved vary with the body doing the counting.
The Executive Unit for the Management of Displaced Persons Camps documented 21,583 families, or 146,943 people, displaced across eight provinces between Sept. 1 and Sept. 18. It attributed the movement to deteriorating security conditions.
The unit is the government body responsible for managing displacement camps.
UN aid agencies gave a figure of more than 112,000 people over two weeks, recorded across Aden, Hudaydah, Abyan and Taiz. They gave it at a briefing in Geneva on Friday.
The agencies said hostilities had escalated rapidly along the western coast.
Abdusattor Esoev, chief of mission in Yemen for the International Organization for Migration, took part in that briefing.
IOM earlier counted 85,818 people. A local authority in Taiz counted 65,845 in camps it said were past capacity.
UNHCR asked donors for $14 million on Tuesday to help Yemenis displaced by the fighting. It said a camp in Djibouti receiving people who had crossed the Red Sea was nearing capacity.
The government has given the displacement and irregular migration file to Waleed al-Abara, a minister of state, Yemen Monitor said, citing Saba.
Al-Abara met the Danish Refugee Council’s representative in Yemen, Hisham Ahmed, in Aden. They discussed conditions for displaced people in Aden, Taiz, Lahj and Abyan, according to that report.
Al-Abara described a continuing influx of people leaving homes and property behind, in remarks Yemen Monitor attributed to him.
Mukhtar al-Yafai, the minister of social affairs and labour, met Peter Ekayu, the deputy head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Yemen.
Their meeting reviewed humanitarian interventions and funding and delivery levels in Aden, Lahj, Abyan and al-Dhalea, Yemen Monitor said.
Yemen Monitor reported separately on Sunday that the UN had called for urgent international support for families displaced by the escalation.
The government asked UN agencies on Sept. 16 to expand their operations in areas under its control.
The new caseload lands on an aid operation that was already short of money.
OCHA’s humanitarian needs and response plan for 2026, issued in March, put more than 22 million people in Yemen in need of assistance.
It recorded 18.3 million people as acutely food insecure and more than 2.2 million children under five as acutely malnourished, 516,157 of them severely.
The plan counted 5.2 million people already internally displaced before the west coast fighting began. It sought $2.16 billion to reach 12 million people.
The plan is the UN’s main funding request for Yemen this year.
OCHA said aid agencies reached 10.83 million people in Yemen between January and July.
The World Health Organization puts the number needing health assistance at close to 20 million.
Yemen’s health ministry said this week that looting of aid facilities in Khokha was depriving patients of care.
Aden is the seat of Yemen’s internationally recognised government.
Al-Faqmi met the director general of the International Organization for Migration in Aden on Sept. 14, when both called for more funding.
Saba did not say when UNHCR’s shelter deliveries would begin.
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