Saudi Arabia announced on Tuesday it would contribute $500 million in humanitarian assistance for Yemen. The pledge was announced at a UN pledging conference in Geneva where the world body is seeking $4 billion in humanitarian aid for Yemen this year. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the conference that UN aid officials have been able to reach the Red Sea Mills in Yemen's Hodeida port for the first time in six months. "I just received an important piece of good news, for the first time in six months, finally it was possible for us to reach the so-called Red Sea mills which are important infrastructure in relation to distribution of namely essential food and other elements," Guterres said. "So at least slowly some progress is being made." A spokesman for the UN's World Food Program said it was an evaluation mission that had reached the warehouse near the western port city of Hodeida. "Today, for the first time since September, a World Food Program team was able to reach the site of the Red Sea Mills, which holds 51,000 metric tonnes of grain, which is enough to feed more than 3.7 million people for a month," Herve Verhoosel said. According to the UN appeal published Tuesday, 14.3 million of Yemen's inhabitants are in acute need of assistance, and Guterres stressed the particularly heavy burden on children. Around 360,000 children in the country are suffering from severe acute malnutrition, and Guterres pointed to a "credible" report issued by Save the Children last November, indicating that more than 80,000 infants under the age of five may have died of starvation since 2015. — Agencies
