Yemen

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ms Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP)]

As we have heard, the conflict in Yemen has sometimes been labelled a forgotten conflict. I want to pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), who mentioned earlier that it has not been forgotten in this House. I also want to pay tribute to the hon. Members for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) and for Warwick and Leamington (Chris White) for their excellent contributions to the debate, which I have thoroughly enjoyed. It has given all of us here in Parliament a chance to keep the issue at the forefront of the public debate and to remember those killed and injured as a result of the ongoing violence and those who are starving or stricken with illness as a result of the breakdown of civil society.

We must also remember the UK’s central role in the middle east, and in particular in this conflict. It is our moral and civic duty—and also in our best pragmatic, strategic self-interest—to do all we can to end the conflict and bring peace to Yemen. I think that there is consensus across the Chamber that that is what must happen, first and foremost because the humanitarian suffering in the country has now reached a horrifying tipping point.

I was grateful this week to have the opportunity to host a presentation by a range of aid organisations, setting out the scale and scope of the human suffering we are now seeing in the Yemeni population. We were warned by Oxfam, Christian Aid and the Yemen Safe Passage Group that the dangers of famine in the country are now very real indeed.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend mentioned Oxfam. I have been contacted by a number of constituents who are supporting Oxfam’s Red Line for Yemen campaign. Will she join me in welcoming the campaign and support its call for the Government to uphold the spirit of the arms trade treaty and end any illegal arms sales that could be used to cause further suffering in Yemen?

[Ms Ahmed-Sheikh]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising awareness of that campaign, and I hope that many more people will now sign up to it.

Even before this conflict, Yemen was reliant on imports for between 90% and 95% of its food. By October 2016, the combined effect of a blockade of ports by coalition forces and severe damage to roads and port facilities meant that imported food covered only 40% of demand.