Yemen: Donated UN food aid for the most needy sold in markets to boost stallholders’ profits
A Sky News team inside Yemen has discovered shocking evidence that donated UN food aid meant for the most needy is instead being sold in street markets to help boost stallholders’ profits.
We found that donated cans of vegetable oil with World Food Programme (WFP) stamps on them were among the essential food items being sold in the province of Hodeidah. Alongside the WFP stamp, there were clear signs in English on the can saying “not for sale”.
In the same market stall in al Khokha, our investigations revealed sacks of flour and rice, also with large lettering saying “not for sale”, which appeared to have been donated by aid agencies from South Korea.
Warning: This article contains images some may find distressing
When we confronted the shopkeeper, he at first denied he was selling donated food aid. He then tried to hide the incriminating World Food Programme cereal packets that we had spotted on his counter.
This vegetable oil clearly says ‘not for sale’
Sacks of flour and rice, with large lettering saying ‘not for sale’, have also been found
When we continued to press him and drew attention to large supplies of the donated cereal at the back of his store, he admitted he knew he was not meant to be selling the donated goods.
He then insisted he would halt the practice that day – an assurance which few who heard him actually believed, given the large stock of donated aid he had in his small store.
But he insisted that he was certainly not the only stallholder selling food aid – and that he was fulfilling a “service” to desperate villagers.
“People come to me who have received the food aid but they need to sell it to me so they can buy medicine for their children. They sell it and I buy it in an emergency,” he attempted to explain.
This shopkeeper at first denied he was selling donated food aid
He later insisted he was certainly not the only stallholder selling food aid
Our investigation comes as the United Nations latest figures showed that children are the biggest victims in Yemen’s eight-year-old war.
According to UN figures, a child dies in Yemen every 10 minutes from preventable causes. That is a staggeringly high number of unnecessary deaths.
There are an estimated 11 million children who are identified as needing humanitarian aid in Yemen.
We are the first foreign journalist team inside Yemen since Iran and Saudi Arabia announced a dramatic breakthrough which has taken the country the closest it has got to possible peace in the eight years of conflict.
What we’ve discovered is both heartbreaking and shocking.
Ahad emaciated and weak
We saw a three-year-old little girl called Ahad being brought into a remote, basic clinic in al Khokha to try to get help.
Ahad is literally starving to death
Her ribs were protruding through her stretched skin. Her eyes were huge in the centre of a gaunt face and her limbs seemed massively elongated because of the lack of muscle or fat anywhere on her body.
She weighed just 3kg – at three years of age – that’s less than what an average newborn weighs fresh out of their mother’s womb.
Ahad couldn’t stand or sit because she was so emaciated and weak. She has Down’s syndrome too which is rarely seen here and the nurses who’re trying to care for her seem powerless to stop her slow inexorable decline. She is literally starving to death.
She’d only relatively recently been discharged from the small field hospital which operates here – just 10 days ago when she’d reached 4kg. In less than a fortnight, she’d dropped a kilo that she simply cannot afford to lose and which could cost her life.
Her father Saeed Saleh told us: “She just keeps bringing up the food we give her. She can’t seem to keep anything down.”
The tragedy for Yemen is that she is certainly not a rare case. At the same time as Ahad was being re-admitted, a six-month-old baby boy called Abdullah Mohammed Abdullah was crying in the arms of his 16-year-old mother.
As she rocked him backward and forward and tried to comfort her baby boy, the nurses noted she too looked malnourished.
She was certainly struggling to breastfeed. That could have explained why her little boy was a mass of skin and bone with the same huge starving eyes peering out from a skeletal face and body where the line of every rib can be clearly seen.
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Victims of forgotten war
There seems to be desperation and starvation everywhere. At the al Jasha camp for internally displaced people (IDP), there are nearly 9,000 people living in squalor. It is a place where only misery is guaranteed.
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What’s happening in Yemen?
Within seconds of us arriving, we were surrounded by angry people begging us for help and insisting in loud voices they were desperate and they were hungry.
“We don’t have anything to eat. Not even a little bit of rice. Nothing. We are suffocating, we are dying,” one man yells.
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Yemen: ‘We can never do enough’
The UN humanitarian chief recently warned that essential aid programmes were being closed down because of funding cuts and food rations had been reduced for eight million people in Yemen.
For a country in the grips of a humanitarian catastrophe it’s a bleak and terrifying future for millions.
Alex Crawford reports from Yemen with Middle East editor Zein Ja’far, cameraman Jake Britton and Yemen producer Ahmed Baider
World
US announces it will increase steps to limit revenue of Venezuelan president Maduro – as he begins third term
The US has announced it has increased its reward for information leading to the arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
In a statement on Friday, the US treasury said up to $25m is being offered for information leading to the arrest of Mr Maduro and his named interior minister Diosdado Cabello.
Up to $15m is also being offered for information on the incoming defence minister Vladimir Padrino. Further sanctions have also been introduced against the South American country’s state-owned oil company and airline.
The reward was announced as Mr Maduro was sworn in for a third successive term as the Venezuelan president, following a disputed election win last year.
Sanctions from the US, UK and EU came as Maduro was sworn in for a third term as president. Pic: Reuters
Elvis Amoroso, head of the National Electoral Council, said at the time Mr Maduro had secured 51% of the vote, beating his opponent Edmundo Gonzalez, who won 44%.
But while Venezuela’s electoral authority and top court declared him the winner, tallies confirming Mr Maduro’s win were never released. The country’s opposition also insists that ballot box level tallies show Mr Gonzalez won in a landslide.
Nationwide protests broke out over the dispute, with a brawl erupting in the capital Caracas when dozens of police in riot gear blocked the demonstrations and officers used tear gas to disperse them.
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From July 2024: Protests after Venezuela election results
More than 2,000 demonstrators were arrested, and Mr Gonzalez fled to Spain to seek asylum in September.
While being sworn in at the national assembly, Mr Maduro said: “May this new presidential term be a period of peace, of prosperity, of equality and the new democracy.”
He also accused the opposition of attempting to turn the inauguration into a “world war,” adding: “I have not been made president by the government of the United States, nor by the pro-imperialist governments of Latin America.”
Lammy: Election ‘neither free nor fair’
The UK and EU have also introduced new sanctions against Venezuelan officials – including the president of Venezuela’s supreme court Caryslia Beatriz Rodriguez Rodriguez and the director of its criminal investigations department Asdrubal Jose Brito Hernandez.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy said Mr Maduro’s “claim to power is fraudulent” and that last year’s election “was neither free nor fair”.
“The UK will not stand by as Maduro continues to oppress, undermine democracy, and commit appalling human rights violations,” he added.
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Mr Maduro and his government have always rejected international sanctions as illegitimate measures that amount to an “economic war” designed to cripple Venezuela.
Those targeted by the UK’s sanctions will face travel bans and asset freezes, preventing them from entering the country and holding funds or economic resources.
World
Donald Trump says he’s ‘totally innocent’ and thanks judge moments before no-penalty sentence in hush money case
Donald Trump has been handed a no-penalty sentence following his conviction in the Stormy Daniels hush money case.
The incoming US president has received an unconditional discharge – meaning he will not face jail time, probation or a fine.
Manhattan Judge Juan M Merchan could have jailed him for up to four years.
The sentencing in Manhattan comes just 10 days before the 78-year-old is due to be inaugurated as US president for a second time on 20 January.
Trump appeared at the hearing by video link and addressed the court before he was sentenced, telling the judge the case had been a “very terrible experience” for him.
He claimed it was handled inappropriately and by someone connected with his political opponents – referring to Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg.
As it happened:
Trump sentenced in Manhattan court
Trump said: “It was done to damage my reputation so I would lose the election.
“This has been a political witch hunt.
“I am totally innocent. I did nothing wrong.”
Concluding his statement, he said: “I was treated very unfairly and I thank you very much.”
The judge then told the court it was up to him to “decide what is a just conclusion with a verdict of guilty”.
He said: “Never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances.
“This has been a truly extraordinary case.”
He added that the “trial was a bit of a paradox” because “once the doors closed it was not unique”.
Pic: Reuters
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass had earlier argued in court that Trump “engaged in a campaign to undermine the rule of law” during the trial.
“He’s been unrelenting in his attacks against this court, prosecutors and their family,” Mr Steinglass said.
“His dangerous rhetoric and unconstitutional conduct has been a direct attack on the rule of law and he has publicly threatened to retaliate against the prosecutors.”
Mr Steinglass said this behaviour was “designed to have a chilling effect and to intimidate”.
It comes after the US Supreme Court rejected a last-ditch attempt by Trump to delay sentencing in the case on Thursday.
Trump’s lawyers argued that evidence used during the trial violated last summer’s Supreme Court ruling giving Trump broad immunity from prosecution over acts he took as president.
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Trump appeared via videolink with his attorney Todd Blanche. Pic: Reuters
Trump’s hush money conviction in May 2024 means he will become the first person convicted of a felony to assume the US presidency.
He was found guilty in New York of 34 counts of falsifying business records relating to payments made to Ms Daniels, an adult film actor, before he won the 2016 US election.
Prosecutors claimed he had paid her $130,000 (£105,300) in hush money to not reveal details of what Ms Daniels said was a sexual relationship in 2006.
Trump has denied any liaison with Ms Daniels or any wrongdoing.
The trial made headlines around the world but the details of the case or Trump’s conviction didn’t deter American voters from picking him as president for a second time.
Trump appears in court during his trial. Pic: AP
What is an unconditional discharge?
Under New York state law, an unconditional discharge is a sentence imposed “without imprisonment, fine or probation supervision”.
The sentence is handed down when a judge is “of the opinion that no proper purpose would be served by imposing any condition upon the defendant’s release”, according to the law.
It means Trump’s hush money case has been resolved without any punishment that could interfere with his return to the White House.
Unconditional discharges have been handed down in previous cases where, like Trump, people have been convicted of falsifying business records.
They have also been applied in relation to low-level offences such as speeding, trespassing and marijuana-related convictions.
World
Family of Leicester City chairman killed in football stadium helicopter crash sue manufacturer for £2bn
Leicester City’s owners have launched a landmark lawsuit against a helicopter manufacturer following the club chairman’s death in a crash in 2018.
Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha’s family are suing Italian company Leonardo SpA for £2.15bn after the 60-year-old chairman and four others were killed when their helicopter crashed just outside the King Power Stadium in October 2018.
The lawsuit is the largest fatal accident claim in English history, according to the family’s lawyers. They are asking for compensation for the loss of earnings and other damages, as a result of the billionaire’s death.
The legal action comes more than six years after the fatal crash and as an inquest into the death of the 60-year-old chairman and his fellow passengers is set to begin on Monday.
Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha celebrating after Leicester City won the Premier League in 2016. Pic: AP
Mr Srivaddhanaprabha’s son Khun Aiyawatt Srivaddhanaprabha, who took over as the club’s chairman, said: “My family feels the loss of my father as much today as we ever have done.
“That my own children, and their cousins will never know their grandfather compounds our suffering… My father trusted Leonardo when he bought that helicopter but the conclusions of the report into his death show that his trust was fatally misplaced. I hold them wholly responsible for his death.”
The late Mr Srivaddhanaprabha’s company, King Power, was earning more than £2.5bn in revenue per year, according to his family’s lawyers. The lawsuit claims “that success was driven by Khun Vichai’s vision, drive, relationships, entrepreneurism, ingenuity and reputation.”
“All of this was lost with his death,” it adds.
The fatal crash took place shortly after the helicopter took off from Leicester’s ground following a 1-1 draw against West Ham on 27 October 2018.
The aircraft landed on a concrete step and four of the five occupants survived the initial impact, but all subsequently died in the fuel fire that engulfed the helicopter within a minute.
Thousands of tributes were left outside the ground in the wake of the tragedy. Pic: James Wilson/Sportimage
The other victims were two of Mr Srivaddhanaprabha’s staff, Nursara Suknamai and Kaveporn Punpare, pilot Eric Swaffer and Mr Swaffer’s girlfriend Izabela Roza Lechowicz, a fellow pilot.
Investigators found the pilot’s pedals became disconnected from the tail rotor – resulting in the aircraft making a sharp right turn which was “impossible” to control, before the helicopter spun quickly, approximately five times.
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The Air Accidents Investigation Branch described this as “a catastrophic failure” and concluded the pilot was unable to prevent the crash.
The lawsuit alleges the crash was the result of ‘multiple failures’ in Leonardo’s design process. It also alleges that the manufacturer failed to warn customers or regulators about the risk.
Sky News has contacted helicopter manufacturer Leonardo for comment.
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