Yemenis in Brussels urge EU to press Houthis over Taiz siege
Yemen Herald News 
BRUSSELS, Belgium — Yemeni demonstrators gathered outside the European Parliament on Friday to urge the European Union to press the Houthis to lift their siege of Taiz.
The protest was organised by the Yemeni community in Brussels, the Yemeni state news agency Saba reported. Yemeni academics, human rights activists and journalists from the Netherlands and Belgium took part.
Participants gathered under the slogan “Lift the Siege on Taiz, Stop the Houthi Threat”.
They issued a written statement addressed to the European Parliament, the European Commission and the European External Action Service.
The statement called for the permanent and safe reopening of the main roads into the governorate.
It asked the European Union to secure freedom of movement for civilians and the delivery of goods and humanitarian aid.
Patients and the wounded should be able to reach health facilities without obstruction, it said.
The participants also asked for measures to protect civilians, for violations to be investigated and for those responsible to be held to account under international law.
They called for support for the voluntary, safe and dignified return of displaced families to their homes.
The statement asked the bloc to counter threats to shipping in the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandab strait, and to unify European positions on Houthi violations.
“The tragedy in Yemen cannot be reduced to figures and reports,” the statement said.
It described the Houthis as an Iran-backed terrorist militia. That wording is the participants’ own. The Houthi movement did not publicly respond to the protest.
Yemen Monitor, a Yemeni news site, also reported the demonstration and said it was held on Friday. It said participants demanded an end to the siege, the opening of roads and an end to attacks on civilians.
Neither account gave a figure for how many people attended, and neither named individual speakers.
A second protest was held in front of the Peace Palace in The Hague, which houses the International Court of Justice, Yemen Monitor reported. It was organised by the Yemeni community in the Netherlands under the same slogan.
Participants there asked the Dutch government to use its influence directly and through the European Union and the United Nations to keep roads open, deliver food, fuel and medicine, and secure medical transport.
The Brussels protest came a day after members of the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the implications of Houthi attacks for regional security.
The resolution calls on the Council of the European Union to place the Houthi movement on the bloc’s terrorist list, including its military and political wings, its leadership and its security apparatus.
Members condemned Houthi missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia and the group’s offensive inside Yemen as violations of international law. They also condemned Iran’s support for the group.
The text asks the Council to act but does not itself impose anything. Asset freezes and travel bans require the Council’s approval.
Hana Jalloul, who led negotiations on the text for the Socialists and Democrats group, called at a debate the previous Tuesday for wider sanctions and for action on Houthi disruption of the Bab al-Mandab strait.
The European Union had already raised the siege. In a statement posted on 14 October it called on the Houthis to lift their siege of Taiz so that aid could enter.
Civilians and civilian infrastructure must be protected and partners must be allowed to deliver essential goods, the bloc said.
On the day of the protest, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said more than 800,000 people in Taiz had been cut off from aid.
Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the office, told a news conference in Geneva that it was 20 days and counting since the city was cut off. At least 200,000 of those affected are women and children, he said.
About three-quarters of the city’s residents depend on humanitarian assistance, according to the World Food Programme.
The road linking Taiz to Aden, the seat of the internationally recognised government, has been cut. Most residents rely on water delivered by truck, and its price has tripled.
Christian Lindmeier, a spokesman for the World Health Organization, said 42 health facilities in Taiz face acute shortages of fuel, oxygen and medicine.
Cooking gas is largely unavailable, which threatens the community kitchens that feed families. Little fuel or food has reached the city since the Houthis encircled it in early October.
Local aid groups are drawing on their remaining stocks to keep water pumps and hospitals running, the office said.
UN screenings have found more than 52,000 children in the city with acute malnutrition, about 11,500 of them severely.
The coordination office said almost 260,000 people have been displaced across Yemen since August, with about half taking refuge in Taiz.
The UN human rights office verified 251 civilian casualties over the same period. It recorded 57 people killed and 194 wounded, and said half of those killed were children.
Humanitarian agencies have reached more than 174,000 displaced people since August, close to six in 10 displaced households, the coordination office said.
Newly displaced families name shelter as their most pressing need, followed by food and cash.
Saba carried the Brussels statement on Saturday.
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