Saudi-led coalition air strikes hit a hospital in a rebel-held province of northwest Yemen on Monday killing at least six people, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and a rebel official said.
Advertisement
The group, known by the French acronym MSF, said the strike hit near the Houthi rebel stronghold of Saada, where teams were still attending to the wounded, reports the AP.
“Deliberately targeting medical facilities is a serious violation of global humanitarian law which would amount to a war crime”, said Magdalena Mughrabi, Amnesty International’s deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme.
MSF said it had treated more than 4,600 patients since July 2015, when it began supporting the hospital.
The blast “partially destroyed” Abs hospital, immediately killing nine people, including an MSF staff member, while two more patients died while being transferred to another clinic, the Paris-based agency said.
The de facto authorities in northern Yemen, dominated by the Houthi rebel movement, blamed the attack on a Saudi-led coalition against the rebels, which has repeatedly pounded the region.
The Arab coalition has been battling Iran-backed rebels in Yemen since March 2015 in support of Yemen’s government, after the insurgents seized Sanaa before expanding to other parts of the country.
On Saturday 10 children were killed in an attack on a school in neighbouring Saada province, according to MSF.
“Without action, these public gestures are meaningless for today’s victims”.
“People in Yemen continue to be killed and injured while seeking medical care”, Sancristóval said.
The coalition denied targeting a school, saying instead that it bombed a camp at which rebels train underage soldiers. “We will provide more information as it becomes available”.
“Strikes on humanitarian facilities including hospitals are particularly concerning”, she said. The world can not continue to turn a blind eye as the most vulnerable suffer in this awful conflict.
The hospital had a 14-bed emergency room, a maternity unit and a surgical unit.
Advertisement
It is not the first time a hospital supported by Doctors Without Borders has been hit in Yemen.
