243 more Pinoys repatriated from strife-torn Yemen –DFA

Over 200 Filipinos including children have been successfully repatriated from strife-torn Yemen, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) announced Tuesday.

The DFA said of the 243 new repatriates, 110 were males, 112 were  females and 21 were children. A Yemeni father of Filipino children was also part of the group.

“The second batch left the Yemeni capital city of Sana'a at 8:30 a.m. (Saudi time) on Monday and arrived at the Tuwal-Jizan border crossing later in the afternoon of the same day,” the DFA said in a news release.

This recent repatriation brings the total number of evacuees from Yemen to 342.

There is also a third batch of evacuees composed of 44 Filipinos that has already left the coastal city of Hodeidah, the DFA said.

In February, the DFA raised Alert Level 4 in Yemen that entails mandatory repatriation of Filipinos there.

The move comes after the Philippine Embassy in Saudi Arabia, which has consular jurisdiction over Filipinos in Yemen, cited the worsening political and security situation in the Southwest Asian nation due to the ongoing armed conflict there.

Recent reports from Yemen indicated that Houthi fighters and allied army units had clashed with local militias in the southern city of Aden on Sunday, and eyewitnesses said gun battles and heavy shelling ripped through a downtown district near the city's port.

The Houthi forces have been battling to take Aden, a last foothold of fighters loyal to Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, advancing to the city center despite 11 days of air strikes by a Saudi-led coalition of mainly Gulf air forces.

Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia launched the air strikes on March 26 in an attempt to turn back the Iran-allied Shi'ite Houthis, who already control Yemen's capital Sanaa, and restore some of Hadi's crumbling authority.

The air and sea campaign has targeted Houthi convoys, missiles and weapons stores and cut off any possible outside reinforcements - although the Houthis deny Saudi accusations that they are armed by Tehran.

The fighting has failed so far to inflict any decisive defeat on the Houthis, or the supporters of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh who are fighting alongside them, but the growing death toll and humanitarian suffering has alarmed aid groups. —Andrei Medina/KBK, GMA News

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