Zarif calls for collective intl. efforts to end Yemen nightmare

Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran Mohammad Javad Zarif has called for a collective international effort to end the "nightmare" of war in impoverished Yemen, rejecting a military solution to the conflict in the Arab country.

On his official Twitter account on Wednesday, the top Iranian diplomat expressed Tehran’s readiness to contribute to any efforts towards an immediate ceasefire, delivery of humanitarian aid and an intra-Yemeni dialogue aimed at ending the conflict in the country.   

On December 13, on his Twitter account he wrote: "Ending the nightmare that is the war in Yemen is our collective responsibility. We welcome the growing recognition that there is no military solution, and we are ready to contribute to any effort towards an immediate ceasefire, humanitarian assistance and intra-Yemeni dialogue."

Meanwhile, Stephen Anderson, Yemen country director for the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP), on Tuesday said: “We will have a large-scale humanitarian catastrophe of a much larger magnitude than we currently face if commercial vessels carrying food and fuel can’t get in. It will be beyond the control of the humanitarian community."

“We are trying to help prevent a famine from occurring,” he added.

Yemen is also suffering from an outbreak of cholera, with children making up nearly a third of infections of the waterborne disease. 

Some 960,000 suspected cases of cholera and 2,219 deaths have been reported since the epidemic began in April, the latest figures released by the World Health Organization show.

More than 12,000 people have been killed since the onset of the Saudi Arabian campaign.

SS