A six-year-old Yemeni boy died on Sunday after Houthis attacked a residential neighbourhood in Taiz Governorate, southwest of Yemen on Saturday.
The Houthis on Saturday afternoon fired an artillery barrage at houses in the densely populated city, fatally wounding 11 children who were playing outside their houses in the Zaid Al Moshki neighbourhood, Taiz.
The Houthi bombing of Taiz is the latest in a series of similarly deadly attacks that have occurred over the past four months.
The attack took place while UN envoy Anthony Hayward was visiting Taiz and comes as the United Nations continues to push the warring parties to agree to a six-month extension of the truce as international pressure builds on both sides to end the war.
Human rights, governmental organizations and parties continued including the UN continue to condemn the attacks that kill the innocent.
UN Special Envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, condemned the attack on the residential neighbourhood of Zaid Al-Mushki in Taiz Governorate.
“I condemn the attack that hit the residential neighbourhood of Zaid al-Mushki in Taiz, which resulted in the death of a child and the injury of 11 others,” Grundberg tweeted, calling on the warring parties to adhere to international law regarding the protection of civilians, especially with regard to the killing of children and injuring them.
The UN envoy expressed his grave concern about this and other attacks elsewhere in Yemen that occurred during the truce, adding, “The people of Taiz have suffered greatly during seven years of war, and they also need the truce to be achieved in all its aspects.”
The UN envoy confirmed his continued engagement with the parties to extend and expand the truce to ensure that Yemenis throughout the country enjoy greater freedom of movement and an adequate level of protection.
“This heinous crime, during UN truce & presence of a UN delegation in Taiz to monitor the truce, confirms Houthi terrorist militia’s defiance of intl (sic) community & indifference to intl de-escalation calls & efforts to alleviate human suffering, & put an end to civilians’ suffering,” Yemen’s Information Minister Muammar Al-Eryani tweeted.
Taiz, Yemen’s third largest city and capital of the province of the same name, has been under a rebel siege since 2016.
Yemen is witnessing a humanitarian truce that entered into force on April 2, and despite the concessions of the Yemeni government, the Houthi militia refuses two UN proposals to implement one of its main provisions, which is to lift the siege of Taiz and open roads.
Yemen has been mired in civil war since September 2014 when the Houthi militia forced the internationally recognized government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.
Since March 2015, the Arab coalition has been carrying out military operations in support of government forces in Yemen, to confront the Iranian-backed Houthis, who control several governorates, including the capital, Sanaa.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed directly or indirectly as a result of the war and millions more displaced, creating what the UN has called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
