SHAFAQNA – MSF – Medecins Sans Frontieres – an NGO offering civilian populations health services and first aid assistance was targeted this Monday by a Saudi-led air raid.
At least five people were killed and 10 others were injured when a “projectile” hit a hospital supported by Medecins Sans Frontieres in northern Yemen on Sunday, the group said.
Three of the injured were members of MSF, and two are in critical condition, the group said.
Several buildings collapsed and people may still be trapped in the rubble, according to MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders.
“According to our staff on the ground, at 9.20am one projectile impacted the Shiara Hospital in Razeh district, where MSF has been working since November 2015,” according to the statement.
“This is the third severe incident in the last 3 months. Our teams struggle on a daily basis to ensure the respect of health facilities,” MSF wrote. An earlier tweet by the group described the projectile as a rocket.
Regional MSF operations chief Raquel Ayora said all warring parties are regularly informed of the GPS coordinates of the medical sites where the group works, and that MSF was in constant dialog with them.
“There is no way that anyone with the capacity to carry out an air strike or launch a rocket would not have known that the Shiara Hospital was a functioning health facility providing critical services and supported by MSF,” she said.
MSF said Saudi-led air strikes hit another of its health facilities elsewhere in the province in October last year, wrecking the building and lightly wounding two staff members.
Nearly 6,000 people have been killed since the Saudi coalition unilaterally declared war on Yemen – March 2015.
The war has exacerbated hunger and disease in Yemen, the region’s poorest country.
Rights activists in Sana’a, the capital have decried Saudi Arabia’s brutal campaign against civilian infrastructures, stressing that such acts are contrary to international law.
So far the United Nations have failed to challenge Riyadh on its aggravated human rights violation and compounded war crimes.