The Netherlands has contributed USD 2.1 million towards IOM’s
efforts to help vulnerable migrants from the Horn of Africa
stranded in Yemen en route to Saudi Arabia.

The contribution, the largest by the Netherlands for IOM
activities in the Middle East, will be used to provide humanitarian
aid to thousands of stranded migrants in Yemen, who often suffer
terrible conditions and abuse on their journey to find jobs and
security in the Gulf States.

The agreement was signed at IOM Headquarters by IOM Director
General William Lacy Swing and Dutch Ambassador and Permanent
Representative to the UN in Geneva Roderick van Schreven. It was
witnessed by the Yemeni Permanent Representative to the UN,
Ambassador Ibrahim Saied Mohamed Al-Adoofi.

Ongoing instability, building on the political turmoil of 2011,
has precipitated the humanitarian situation in Yemen with
drastically diminished service delivery, worrying malnutrition
levels, and continued insecurity.

But irregular migrant flows from the Horn of Africa continue
unabated, through unscrupulous and increasingly vicious trafficking
networks. At least 4,000 migrants remain stranded at the Saudi
border near the town of Haradh.

IOM established a migrant response centre and a clinic in
Haradh, providing essential health assistance to the injured and
abused, as well as one meal per day to the most vulnerable. Until
March 2012, IOM was also able to provide emergency voluntary return
assistance, helping some 7,000 Ethiopians to return home from
Haradh.

The Dutch funding is the first contribution towards the stranded
migrant assistance component of the 2012 Yemen Humanitarian Appeal.
IOM has been operating migrant assistance and humanitarian
interventions in Yemen since 2007.

These include assistance to displaced families and
conflict-affected communities in the marginalized governorate of Al
Jawf and the restive southern governorate of Abyan, where, since
June 2011, IOM has been providing life-saving support, including
emergency water and sanitation infrastructure, essential shelter,
and mobile health services to families displaced by the violent
conflict between Government of Yemen forces and Al-Qaida linked
militants.

IOM's emergency interventions have been critical in pre-empting
further displacement from the governorate to neighbouring Aden,
which has struggled to accommodate the rapid influx of families
fleeing conflict.

For more information, please contact

Nicoletta Giordano

IOM Yemen

Tel:+967 1410 568/572

Email: "mailto:NGiordano@iom.int">NGiordano@iom.int