Saudi-Led Airstrikes Hit MSF Hospital in Yemen
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A Yemeni hospital run by medical aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) was bombed in a Saudi-led airstrike, wrecking the facility and wounding several people, the hospital director said on Tuesday.
A Saudi-led Arab coalition has begun intervention in Yemen since March in a bid to restore power to fugitive former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi but the civilian death toll has escalated since then, alarming the United Nations and human rights groups.
"The MSF facility in Sa'adah, (north) Yemen was hit by several airstrikes last night with patients and staff inside the facility," Medecins Sans Frontieres said in a tweet, Reuters reported.
Yemen's state news agency Saba quoted the Heedan hospital director as saying several people were injured in the attack in north Yemen.
"The air raids resulted in the destruction of the entire hospital with all that was inside - devices and medical supplies - and the moderate wounding of several people," Ali Mughli said.
Saba said other airstrikes hit a nearby girls school and damaged several civilian homes.
An MSF hospital was bombed in an American airstrike in Kunduz in northern Afghanistan on Oct. 3, killing 30 people including 12 MSF staff.
US President Barack Obama apologized for the attack, but MSF continues to call for an independent humanitarian commission to investigate what it calls a war crime.
"International humanitarian law is not about "mistakes". It is about intention, facts and why ... It is precisely because attacking hospitals in war zones is prohibited that we expected to be protected," MSF director Joanne Liu said this month.
Seven months of airstrikes in Yemen by Saudi Arabia and other US-allied Persian Gulf countries have not yet made headway toward achieving the planned results.
The United States and Britain are supporting the coalition with intelligence and both are long-time arms suppliers to their Persian Gulf Arab allies.
Human rights groups have voiced concern at the mounting death toll from the Saudi-led aggression on Yemen. Amnesty International has recommended an arms embargo on coalition states, citing repeated bombing of Yemeni civilians.
In a separate bombing on Monday, residents reported that a coalition airstrike killed Haradh hospital director Yasser Wathab and two people he was traveling with in a car in the northwestern province of Hajja. They said the group were en route to treat patients hit by an earlier airstrike.
More than 5,600 people have died in Yemen's conflict and shuttle diplomacy by a United Nations envoy has yet to secure a political solution or reduce the intensity of combat.
