'There Is a US Imprint on the Death of Every Child in Yemen': Sen. Chris Murphy

As the “humanitarian nightmare” gripping Yemen rages on, the head of the United Nations World Food Program pleaded for the United States to “end this war,” while a group of U.S. lawmakers underscored American complicity in civilian deaths.

“What I have seen in Yemen this week is the stuff of nightmares, of horror, of deprivation, of misery. And we—all of humanity —have only ourselves to blame,” World Food Program (WFP) executive director David Beasley told the U.N. Security Council on Friday after finishing a three-day visit to the war-ravaged country.

“This is not on the brink of a catastrophe. This is a catastrophe,” he told reporters.

While the White House recently announced it was ending its policy of refueling Saudi planes, the U.S. continues to provide assistance to the bombing campaign with intelligence and arms—that’s despite increased scrutiny over rights abuses by the kingdom, and despite the fact that the conflict has led to what the U.N. calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

In light of that role, Beasley said to NPR that the U.S. must “end this war.”

In the meantime, the U.S. should provide sufficient funding for the agency to “make certain that every innocent Yemeni who’s not involved in combat has the food they need to keep their children and their family alive,” Beasley said in the interview that aired Monday.

Beasley’s visit to the country included a stop in Hodeidah; it’s a key port because over 80 percent of humanitarian aid passes through there. Yet it’s become “a true militarized combat zone,” he told NPR.

“My heart is breaking after what I saw at the hospital in Hodeidah,” Beasley said in a statement. “Small children, so malnourished they’re little more than skin and bone, lying there with hardly the strength to breathe. In the name of humanity, I urge all warring parties to put an end to this horrific war. Let the children live and let the people start to rebuild their lives.”

UNICEF’s regional director Geert Cappelaere, who had just visited over 50 children at a hospital in Hodeidah, had an equally bleak assessment and said last week the conflict had become become a “war on children.”

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