Armies of Liberation

HODEIDAH, Yemen, Sept. 9 (UPI) — The death toll from flooding in western Yemen has climbed to 56, an official says. Heavy rainfall in the Hodeidah province in western Yemen along the Red Sea resulted in two newly confirmed deaths, Yemen’s SABA news agency said. It did not name its medical source.

The latest victims include a child and his pregnant mother, the report said. Flooding in Yemen’s al-Jarrahi district recently killed 11 people, SABA said.

There are good plans to address many urgent issues in Yemen but they are not implemented fully. Power centers within the government thwart reforms to protect their profits. In other cases, coordination among semi-autonomous ministries is nearly impossible to achieve.
IRIN

SANAA, 10 August 2010 (IRIN) – Despite record rainfall in the Yemeni capital Sanaa and other areas this summer, very little is being done to harvest this water to mitigate water shortages, experts say. In May at least seven people were killed in what officials described as the worst flooding to hit Sanaa in a decade. Flooding has brought large parts of the city to a standstill on a number of occasions. Attempts by the government to harvest rainwater are very limited, according to Ramon Scoble, a consultant for Germany’s Technical Cooperation Committee (GTZ). (Read on …)

Normal militaries have discipline, a chain of command and standard operating protocols. Its extremely difficult to believe that a French warship shot down a passenger airplane. The Yemeni military is fractured, chaotic, and makes it up as they go along, but not France, all joking aside. This scenario also implies a massive cover-up by France in the aftermath. Earlier the plane’s black box was described as containing no retrivable data. Its not beyond Yemen’s authorities to make up a wild lie, they do it all the time. This is the al Motamar article which quotes reliable sources stating the investigation concluded a French warship launched a missile at the Airbus, and says Yemen will ask for reimbursement of funds paid to victims families. Here is another article from Arab Monitor.

Must adhere to the party line or else… The French maintain the plane was banned; Yemeni authorities insist it never happened. The military aircraft have similar problems with upkeep on their fleet. The maintenance budget(s) are subject to embezzlement, there’s no oversight and the press is barred from reporting on the military. A journalist who did was kidnapped a few years ago.

al Motamar
Aviation Committee is to sue media instruments that offended Yemeni Airways reputation
Thursday, 02-July-2009
Almotamar.net – The Yemeni Higher Committee for follow-up Aviation Incidents has on Thursday on all different media instruments to the necessity of observing the facts about the crashed Yemeni Airbus plane A 310 that crashed offshore Comoros last Tuesday.

The Yemeni Transport Minister called, in a press conference he held at Sana’a International Airport a short while ago, on the media hat published wrong information to correct them , affirming their keeping the right to sue those media instruments that endeavour to target and offend the reputation of the Yemenia Airways Company via publishing wrong information.

The Minister also pointed out that the Committee has established an information centre at Sana’a International Airport for providing in formation and developments on the crashed plane and operations of rescue that would be reported by an official spokesman in the name of the Committee via continuous news conferences.

The Yemeni Transport Minister also confirmed that the crew of the Yemeni plane was of high skill and efficiency and that the Company would remain adhering to safety criteria.

That’s really a shame, predictable though. OpenDocument

Yemen: Fears of flood-affected farmers abandoning agriculture
Source: United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs – Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN)

Date: 12 Apr 2009

SEYOUN, 12 April 2009 (IRIN) – An official has warned that delays in restoring the severely flood-affected agriculture sector in Hadhramaut Governorate, southeastern Yemen, will prompt farmers to abandon their jobs and seek work in other sectors, affecting food security in the impoverished country. (Read on …)

That’s a friendly nation. Now they just have to oversee it to make sure at least half gets to the actual vicitms in an efficient manner.

Emergency grant aid to the Republic of Yemen for flood disaster
On December 9 (Tues.), the Government of Japan decided to extend emergency grant aid of about 800 thousand dollars (about 90 million yen) through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), to support the victims of the serious flood disaster in the Republic of Yemen.

The Government of Japan has decided to extend this emergency grant aid in view of the necessity of humanitarian assistance and the friendly relationship between Japan and Yemen.

Prior to this decision, the Government of Japan provided emergency relief goods equivalent to 18 million yen. With this further grant aid, the total of emergency assistance from Japan for this flood disaster will be 108 million yen.