At least 115 children have been killed and 172 injured in the Yemeni conflict since the launch of the Saudi-led airstrikes in the country on March 26, said the UN children’s agency on Friday.
At least 64 of the children killed between March 26 and April 20 were victims of the Saudi-led airstrikes, UNICEF spokesman Christophe Boulierac told AFP.
Officials went on to say an additional 19 children had been killed by gunshots and 26 by unexploded ordnance.
Since March 26, at least 140 children have been recruited as fighters by militant groups, according to UNICEF.
A recent UNICEF estimate said around 30 percent of fighters in Yemen are minors. “We are seeing children in battle, at checkpoints, and unfortunately among [those] killed and injured,” UNICEF’s representative in Yemen Julien Harneis told AFP. The children’s agency also predict a rise in the country’s already devastatingly high malnutrition rate.
“All of the parties to the conflict are to blame,” Harneis stated.
