UNITED NATIONS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th December, 2019) The United Nations Refugee Agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) have returned more than 5,000 Somali refugees home from Yemen since 2017, IOM said in a press release on Thursday.
"The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration have helped 5,087 Somali refugees return home from Yemen since 2017," the release said.
IOM also said that in the latest departure that took place earlier in the day, a boat carrying 145 Somali refugees left Yemen's port of Aden and will arrive at the port of Berbera in Somalia on Friday.
According to the UN agency, Yemen hosts around 250,000 Somali refugees, yet more than four years of conflict have deteriorated the situation for them in the middle Eastern country.
The armed conflict in Yemen between the government forces and Houthi rebels has been ongoing since 2015. The former is backed by a military coalition of Arab countries led by Saudi Arabia. The hostilities produced a humanitarian catastrophe in the country, leaving almost 80 percent of the population - or an estimated 24 million people - in acute need of help.
