News Release

Breaking the Yemen Central Bank: Is Saudi Arabia Using Starvation as a Weapon?

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screen_shot_2017-01-07_at_2.39.09_amSee from the UN: “In Yemen, UN aid chief rallies support for relief efforts to prevent famine.” The Washington Post recently reported: “Hundreds of thousands of Yemeni children are nearing starvation.”

See @accuracy Twitter list on Yemen.

GARETH PORTER, porter.gareth50 [at] gmail.com, @GarethPorter
Porter is an independent investigative journalist. His books include Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare. Porter’s articles include, from 2016: “Justifying the Saudi Slaughter in Yemen.”

Porter said today: “Now what we’re seeing is another layer of actually using starvation as a weapon: The Saudi government — with U.S. government support — has effectively eliminated the Central Bank of Yemen. This has been the only institution standing between hundreds of thousands — millions, really — and the prospect of famine.

“Clearly the IMF could not have carried out the action it did — cutting off Yemen from the bank that held its foreign exchange reserve — without U.S. government approval.” See report from the Sana’a Center for Strategic Studies: “Yemen Without a Functioning Central Bank: The loss of basic economic stabilization and accelerating famine.”

Porter added: “An on-going major under-reported story of the Saudi attack on Yemen is that it could not have happened without the active logistical support of the U.S. — i.e., refueling of planes in flight.

“But now, it’s not even enough to stop the bombing, The primary danger is not the immediate bombs. It’s the lack of food and medicine and fuel — and now taking away the capacity of people in Yemen to purchase those necessities.”

ABC News is reporting today: “More than 20 U.S. airstrikes conducted in Yemen overnight.” See from Ben Norton at AlterNet: “U.S.-Backed Saudi Coalition Bombs Another Funeral in Yemen, Killing 8 Women, Child.”