Twenty-nine nongovernmental organizations operating in Yemen are urging the international community to reaffirm its commitment to the Yemeni people, as major challenges threaten to reverse progress and plunge millions of vulnerable people across the country into precarious situations.
On the eve of the seventh Senior Officials Meeting, we note with deep concern that the situation in Yemen has deteriorated significantly since the sixth meeting. Amid continued budget cuts, the country now faces a growing and increasingly complex set of interrelated challenges, which have further intensified since the beginning of 2025. This situation is hampering humanitarian and development efforts, making it even more difficult to reach millions of people in dire emergency situations. We are frontline actors committed to serving those in need and remain ready to provide lifesaving assistance, thanks to the generosity of our donors. In 2024, our collective efforts reached more than eight million people in Yemen.
Since the beginning of 2025, numerous projects have been suspended, blocking the delivery of basic goods, services, and health infrastructure, including hospitals. Vaccination campaigns and centers, particularly important for women and girls, have also been suspended. As a result, lifesaving and longer-term support operations have become inaccessible to many segments of the population in need. Unless alternatives are put in place to compensate for these shortcomings, the already critical situation will continue to worsen. Thus, the return to essential interventions will become significantly more complex and costly over time.
We call on the international community to respond now and take coordinated action to prevent irreversible harm to millions of Yemenis. We also urge donors to adhere to an impartial and principled approach, ensuring that funds are allocated only based on the most urgent needs, regardless of where they are located in the country.
Today, we continue to face a multitude of obstacles preventing us from reaching the populations most in need. In recent months, residents of Yemen have witnessed the destruction of civilian infrastructure in several locations by military airstrikes. These attacks took place in a country already weakened by significantly weakened systems and services. It is necessary to highlight the devastating impact on civilians, including the number of deaths and casualties. The targeting of critical infrastructure not only exacerbates economic and psychological hardship but also limits the ability of humanitarian workers to deliver lifesaving assistance to the most vulnerable.
Committed and dedicated to carrying out donor-funded projects, humanitarian workers face risks and threats to their safety and security in the course of their work. As June 6 approaches, a significant number of staff members from the United Nations, international NGOs, and civil society organizations remain detained after nearly a year. This situation raises deep and growing concerns for their safety and well-being.
We urge all parties to respect international humanitarian law, protect civilians, and avoid targeting civilian infrastructure. Furthermore, we call on Member States to prioritize the current and anticipated humanitarian consequences of the escalating conflict and to strengthen their calls for the protection of civilian infrastructure.
We call on the relevant authorities to ensure the ability of humanitarian workers to carry out their mission and to ensure the immediate and unconditional release of detained personnel, so that they can return to their families and their daily lives in complete safety.
We also call on key regional states, the international community and influential partners to support all efforts aimed at securing the release of detained humanitarian workers and ensuring the protection of humanitarian space.
Our ability to provide essential services to the most vulnerable is regularly hampered by significant sanctions regimes and a complex web of restrictive measures in northern Yemen. These obstacles include difficulties transferring funds, limited access to banking channels, difficulties sourcing goods, and restrictions on commercial imports. The combination of these measures affects the entire country and threatens to seriously disrupt the supply of fuel, medicine, medical equipment, food, and other forms of vital humanitarian assistance, as well as the operation of essential infrastructure and services.
We urgently call on the international community to promote the development of generalized humanitarian exemptions. These are essential to ensure the delivery of aid to those most in need, to preserve the fundamental principles of humanitarian action, and to protect humanitarian space.
In recent months, the Yemeni population has become increasingly vulnerable and in need of enhanced protection, as response capacity diminishes. The situation affects more than two million people, including women and girls who face considerable risks. Without immediate assistance, millions of women and girls will be deprived of essential services that protect them from violence and help them cope with their increasingly deteriorating mental health, putting them at greater risk of depression, self-harm, and suicide. Child marriage, human trafficking, begging, and child labor are all on the rise. Protection should not be an afterthought but an essential component of all humanitarian and development efforts.
We call on all Member States participating in the Senior Officials’ Meeting to ensure that age-, gender-, and disability-appropriate protection is at the heart of the collective response. If protection is neglected, it is the poor who suffer the consequences.
Budget cuts are significantly affecting civil society organizations (CSOs) in Yemen, particularly women-led and women’s rights organizations (WLOs and WROs). Many of them are at risk of closure. It is time for the humanitarian and donor communities to provide their unconditional support to national and local NGOs, particularly to the leadership of WLOs/WROs and to their direct, safe, and meaningful participation in local and national actions.
We call on donors to increase direct and flexible funding for local actors, who are often the first to respond and best placed to intervene. While intermediaries are needed, support must strengthen local leadership, not replace it, through concrete investments in collaboration, accountability, capacity, and risk sharing.
Today, the stakes could not be higher. The international community must act decisively to prevent further tragedy and irreversible damage. As the hardships of the Yemeni people mount, so too must our resolve to act immediately and in full respect of the humanitarian principles we collectively uphold. We must restore hope to the people of Yemen, and we cannot abandon a population in dire need.