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Houthi Restrictions Hinder UN Efforts to Study Food Security in Yemen

Yemenis in Amran governorate, north of Sanaa, waiting to receive food aid (EPA)
Yemenis in Amran governorate, north of Sanaa, waiting to receive food aid (EPA)
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Houthi Restrictions Hinder UN Efforts to Study Food Security in Yemen

Yemenis in Amran governorate, north of Sanaa, waiting to receive food aid (EPA)
Yemenis in Amran governorate, north of Sanaa, waiting to receive food aid (EPA)

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) was unable to assess the food situation of Yemenis living under Houthi control because of restrictions imposed by the Iran-backed group.

OCHA, however, noted that its new analysis on food security showed that the number of aid beneficiaries during the last three months of this year increased to four times the estimated figure in previous outlooks.

The UN body added that two Houthi-run areas are facing the threat of famine.

Weeks after the UN affirmed that the majority of the obstacles encountered by the humanitarian work teams come from Houthis authorities, OCHA stated that the phased classification of food security was updated in 125 districts in the governorates controlled by the internationally recognized government.

OCHA officials have recommended the adoption of hypothetical analyzes for areas controlled by the Houthis.

They pointed out that the analysis that was conducted last February in 208 districts in Houthi-run areas was not updated. Moreover, the officials revised initial assumptions from the previous analysis.

Conclusions by the officials included sudden shocks and other contributing factors such as food prices and floods. These factors were not factored in during the previous analysis.

UN analysis indicated that the number of cases estimated in the previous report suggests that approximately 2.2 million children under the age of five suffer from malnutrition, including 538,000 suffering from acute malnutrition.

Meanwhile, the report predicted that about 1.3 million pregnant and breastfeeding women would suffer from malnutrition.

The analysis update indicated an increased risk.

It pointed to the situation changing in 17 districts and reaching a worse stage compared to last February’s expectations.

In Al-Mahra Governorate, nine regions are under the threat of a crisis. Eight neighborhoods in the city of Aden will move from the crisis stage to the emergency stage.

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Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
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Composer of Piaf's 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' Dies Aged 95

Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File
Charles Dumont wrote a classic song for Edith Piaf. CHRISTOPHE ARCHAMBAULT / AFP/File

Songwriter and singer Charles Dumont, who composed the song "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I do not regret anything") made world famous by Edith Piaf, has died aged 95, his partner told AFP Monday.
Dumont, who had also collaborated with American singer Barbra Streisand and French-Italian 1960s star Dalida, died at home after a long illness.
French Culture Minister Rachida Dati called Dumont "a towering figure of French chanson".
A trumpeter by training, Dumont saw his career transformed at the turn of the 1960s when he convinced the star singer Piaf to perform one of his compositions, after having been forcefully refused several times.
"We turned up at her home, and she let us in," Dumont told AFP in 2018 about the day in 1960 when he managed to see Piaf together with his lyricist, Michel Vaucaire.
"I played the piece on the piano, and ... we became inseparable," he said, adding that the song -- which he had written in 1956 aged 27 -- revived Piaf's career that he said had been flagging.
"Non, je ne regrette rien" has since become an unforgettable classic of Piaf, who died in 1963.
"My mother gave birth to me, but Edith Piaf brought me into the world," Dumont told AFP in a 2015 interview.
"Without her, I would never have done everything I did, neither as a composer nor as a singer," he added.
For Dumont, this meeting marked the beginning of a fruitful working relationship with Piaf, resulting in his writing more than 30 songs for her.
'Goodbye young man'
On occasion she straightened him out, like one night after a concert when he complained to her that the audience had not been good.
"She looked me straight in the eye and said: 'It's not them who are bad. It's you who was no good'," he remembered.
The collaboration with Piaf gave Dumont the confidence to approach Streisand, who was already a star in the 1960s and well on her way to becoming one of the biggest-selling recording artists ever.
A music publisher suggested he should offer her his services, advice he later described as "destiny" giving him "a kick in the behind".
He went to New York, and played for her on a piano in her dressing room in a Broadway theater. "She said to me 'I like this very much. I'll make the record. Goodbye young man'," he said.
Streisand released a single with Dumont's "Le Mur" sung in French on the A side, and its English version "I've Been Here" on the B side, in 1966.
Dumont's last appearance on stage was in 2019 in Paris.
"When you come back in front of an audience, who come to see you as they came 20, 30 or 40 years ago and give you the same welcome, then they give you back your 20s," he said.