The Biden administration has agreed in principle to resume the delivery of tens of thousands of tons of wheat to parts of Yemen territories controlled by Houthi rebels, according to a report published by the media platform Devex.
The move, according to Devex, citing diplomatic sources, will end a year-long diplomatic standoff even as the Iranian-backed insurgents detain United Nations aid workers and attack United States and other international merchant ships on the Red Sea.
The U.S. froze delivery of its food aid to northern Yemen last August, instead storing a shipment of some 60,000 metric tons earmarked for northern Yemen in warehouses in ports in the area.
The action was aimed at strengthening the financially strapped World Food Program's negotiating leverage as it sought to broker a deal that ensured that only those most needing food assistance received it.
In December, WFP formally suspended its general food distribution program in northern Yemen, after the Houthis rejected its distribution plan, which would cut out millions of potential Yemeni beneficiaries — though the U.N. continued a special nutrition program for children and a school feeding program.
The food agency has concluded — on the basis of a pilot retargeting study of beneficiaries — that the Houthis have cooperated enough to justify the resumption of expanded food aid operations.
The Biden administration is awaiting a formal request from WFP, which is headed by Executive Director Cindy McCain, to release its stores of food aid, the sources told Devex.
The Rome-based food agency has no immediate plans to formally end the suspension, but will approve a rapid emergency response operation to feed more than 1 million people as early as next month in Houthi-controlled territory in northern Yemen. The operation is described as a one-off project, but the food agency will continue to explore ways to expand food distribution beyond that, according to diplomatic sources.
“After a very long process, we are getting close to restarting food distribution,” said Julien Harneis, the U.N. resident coordinator in Yemen. Harneis told Devex that the program would be more targeted than in previous years to ensure that assistance reached those most in need. It will “allow us to resume distribution to millions of Yemeni who are vulnerable.”
The decision to restart aid comes at a time when the Houthis have been engaging in increasingly provocative behavior, disrupting international trade with a series of attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea, and detaining dozens of international aid workers and diplomats, including 13 U.N. workers accused of spying on behalf of the U.S. and Israel — a claim a senior U.N. official denounced as an “outrageous allegation.” The detention of U.N. workers is part of a wider dragnet of some 50 Yemeni employees of U.N. agencies, diplomatic missions, private companies, and international aid organizations, according to the U.S.
“The arbitrary detention of civilians in Yemen, including those working for national and international non-governmental and civil society organizations, is absolutely unacceptable,” U.N. Secretary General António Guterres wrote in an internal July 8 note to U.N. staff in Yemen, which was reviewed by Devex. “We are profoundly concerned about the plight of our colleagues detained by the de facto authorities, [and the U.N. is] working through all possible channels to secure the immediate and unconditional release of our colleague.”
Hans Grundberg, the U.N. Special Envoy for Yemen, told the U.N. Security Council on July 23 that the Houthi have not provided access to the detained staffers or information about their whereabouts. “Nearly two months and we have not heard from any of them,” he told the 15-nation council. “They provided humanitarian assistance to those in need. If it were not for these staff members and organizations the effects of the war on Yemen’s population would have been even worse.”