100 Houthi-Bound Drone Parts Seized in Yemen

The busted shipment of drone parts. (Twitter)
The busted shipment of drone parts. (Twitter)
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100 Houthi-Bound Drone Parts Seized in Yemen

The busted shipment of drone parts. (Twitter)
The busted shipment of drone parts. (Twitter)

Yemeni security agencies seized on Monday a shipment of some one hundred drone parts that were bound to the terrorist Iran-backed Houthi militias.

The shipment was busted in the eastern al-Mahra province.

Yemeni official sources said security forces seized the shipment while inspecting a truck at a crossing point.

The owner of the truck claimed that his shipment was loaded with clothes, but after inspection, the smuggled goods were uncovered and seized.

Deputy head of the Consultations and Reconciliation Commission Abdulmalik al-Mekhlafi confirmed that the shipment was loaded with some 100 drone parts that were bound to the Houthis.

In a tweet, he said one hundred drone engines were bound to a terrorist group that has been barred from arming in line with United Nations resolutions.

“How many people could these drones have killed? How many have been smuggled over the past eight years? Doesn’t this demand an international probe?” he wondered.

A report by UN experts had revealed that a land route that stretches from the eastern border is being used by smugglers to the Houthis. They also spoke of marine routes used by smuggling networks in Iran.

The US Navy had in the past two months alone seized a number of vessels that were smuggling weapons and ammunition to the Houthis believed to be provided by Iran.

In November, the US Navy's Fifth Fleet intercepted a fishing vessel smuggling "massive" amounts of explosive material while transiting from Iran along a route in the Gulf of Oman that has been used to traffic weapons to the Houthis.

In early December, the Fleet said it intercepted a fishing trawler smuggling "more than 50 tons of ammunition rounds, fuses and propellants for rockets" in the Gulf of Oman along a maritime route from Iran to Yemen.

Earlier in January, the US Navy seized over 2,100 assault rifles from a ship in the Gulf of Oman it believes came from Iran and were bound for the Houthis.



WHO Sends Over 1 Mln Polio Vaccines to Gaza to Protect Children 

Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
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WHO Sends Over 1 Mln Polio Vaccines to Gaza to Protect Children 

Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)
Displaced Palestinians, who fled their houses due to Israeli strikes, look out from a window as they take shelter, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, July 24, 2024. (Reuters)

The World Health Organization is sending more than one million polio vaccines to Gaza to be administered over the coming weeks to prevent children being infected after the virus was detected in sewage samples, its chief said on Friday.

"While no cases of polio have been recorded yet, without immediate action, it is just a matter of time before it reaches the thousands of children who have been left unprotected," Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in an opinion piece in Britain's The Guardian newspaper.

He wrote that children under five were most at risk from the viral disease, and especially infants under two since normal vaccination campaigns have been disrupted by more than nine months of conflict.

Poliomyelitis, which is spread mainly through the fecal-oral route, is a highly infectious virus that can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis. Cases of polio have declined by 99% worldwide since 1988 thanks to mass vaccination campaigns and efforts continue to eradicate it completely.

Israel's military said on Sunday it would start offering the polio vaccine to soldiers serving in the Gaza Strip after remnants of the virus were found in test samples in the enclave.

Besides polio, the UN reported last week a widespread increase in cases of Hepatitis A, dysentery and gastroenteritis as sanitary conditions deteriorate in Gaza, with sewage spilling into the streets near some camps for displaced people.