Intensified hostilities in Yemen have forced more than 32,000 people to flee their homes in the past two months, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said Thursday (January 18th).
They join some two million Yemenis already displaced by the war, AFP reported.
"The arrival of winter in Yemen, when temperatures can dip below zero degrees Celsius across a number of governorates, has worsened the hardship for many, particularly those displaced and living in informal settlements exposed to the elements with little protection against the cold," the UNHCR said.
UNHCR spokeswoman Shabia Mantoo said flare-ups in fighting in Sanaa, al-Hodeida on the Red Sea and Shabwa in the south, had driven the displacements.
"We continue to see correlations between intensified hostilities and civilian casualties and displacement," Mantoo said in a Friday social media post.
"The latest violence has further exacerbated the world's worst humanitarian crisis, with more than 22 million people -– around three quarters of the total population –- in need of humanitarian assistance," the UNHCR said.
