On late March 2019 the British newspaper The Mail on Sunday reported that British Special Forces are fighting on the same side as jihadists and militia which use child soldiers. After the report, the shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry, questioned these allegations in the British parliament suggesting that the British forces may have been witnesses to war crimes, if the allegations were true. She claimed that as many as 40% of the soldiers in the Saudi coalition were children, a breach of international humanitarian law. In response, the UK Foreign Office minister Mark Field called the allegations "very serious and well-sourced" and promised to get to the bottom of these allegations.
On 8 May, Saudi Arabia announced a five-day ceasefire set to start on 12 May, following heavy pressure from the US. Later in the day, Saudi airplanes dropped leaflets in the Saada Governorate warning of airstrikes throughout the area. Houthi spokesman Mohamed al-Bukhaiti later told the BBC that the ceasefire had not been formally proposed and the Houthis would not respond until a plan was properly laid out. A spokesman for the Houthi-aligned military announced agreement to the ceasefire plan on 10 May, although he warned that a breach of the truce would prompt a military response.
More InfoEgypt and Saudi Arabia committed warships to support coalition operations. Somalia offered its airspace and territorial waters. Four Egyptian Navy vessels steamed toward the Gulf of Aden after operations began. Riyadh requested access to Somali airspace and waters to carry out operations. On 27 March, the Egyptian military said a squadron of Egyptian and Saudi warships took up positions at the Bab al-Mandab strait. The Saudi military threatened to destroy any ship attempting to make port.
More InfoOn 8 May, Saudi Arabia announced a five-day ceasefire set to start on 12 May, following heavy pressure from the US. Later in the day, Saudi airplanes dropped leaflets in the Saada Governorate warning of airstrikes throughout the area. Houthi spokesman Mohamed al-Bukhaiti later told the BBC that the ceasefire had not been formally proposed and the Houthis would not respond until a plan was properly laid out. A spokesman for the Houthi-aligned military announced agreement to the ceasefire plan on 10 May, although he warned that a breach of the truce would prompt a military response.
More InfoThe Saudi-led campaign has received widespread criticism and had a dramatic worsening effect on the humanitarian situation in Yemen, that reached the level of a "humanitarian disaster" or "humanitarian catastrophe". After the Saudi-led coalition declared the entire Saada Governorate a military target, the UN's Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen and Human Rights Watch expressed concern that the bombing there was unnecessarily harming civilians. On 1 July UN declared for Yemen a "level-three" emergency—the highest UN emergency level—for a period of six months. Human rights groups repeatedly blamed the Saudi-led military coalition for killing civilians and destroying health centres and other infrastructure with airstrikes. The de facto blockade left 78% (20 million) of the Yemeni population in urgent need of food, water and medical aid. Aid ships are allowed, but the bulk of commercial shipping, on which the country relies, is blocked. In one incident, coalition jets prevented an Iranian Red Crescent plane from landing by bombing Sanaʽa International Airport's runway, which blocked aid delivery by air. As of 10 December, more than 2,500,000 people had been internally displaced by the fighting. Many countries evacuated more than 23,000 foreign citizens from Yemen. More than 1,000,000 people fled Yemen for Saudi Arabia, Djibouti, Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Oman. The war has caused a humanitarian crisis, including a famine which has threatened over 17 million people, as well as an outbreak of cholera which has infected hundreds of thousands.
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