Yemen - Displaced families from Marib find safety and shelter
Fierce fighting in Marib, Yemen, continues to force thousands of families to flee their homes. New displacement is exacerbating the existing humanitarian needs, for an estimated one million displaced, drastically increasing the need for shelter, essential household items, water and sanitation, education, and protection services – particularly for children.
The poorest displaced families, unable to pay rent, have found safety in existing IDP sites and open areas. For them, securing basic shelter and household items is a matter of physical safety, dignity, privacy, and securing a layer of protection.
“If it weren’t for the shelter materials and shelter services, we wouldn’t know where and how to live,” says Salwa, a 32-year-old Yemeni woman displaced to Marib with her husband and five children.
“Before the war, we were well-off. We had many farms and sheep. We were safe. We never thought that we would be forced to leave our house. But when we saw the battles getting closer, we decided to leave and run away with our children and leave everything we had to be destroyed by missiles and shelling. It was a strange and terrible feeling to leave. We didn’t know where to go. We left all our relatives and friends. A few days after we left, we learnt that a shell had hit our house.”
With CERF funding, UNHCR is assisting 13,000 displaced families like Salwa’s with emergency shelters, kitchen sets, lamps, mattresses, blankets, jerricans, and other items. For families that have left everything behind, these are desperately needed and the minimum to protect them from the elements, sleep, wash, bathe, and cook.