Yemen: Is the World Facing another Holodomor?!

Rumi Akter writes for DOT : 
If asked about the holocaust, there can be a maximum number of people answering that they know about it. But how many of us know about the holodomor? Pretty sure, the number will be less than the number of people who know about the holocaust. The Holocaust, in other words known as the Shoah was the genocide of the Jewish community during the Second World War. The holocaust was led by the Nazi party as the outcome of chauvinism. The chauvinistic ideology of Adolf Hitler is referred to be one of the main reasons behind the brutality against the Jewish people. On the other hand, chronologically the holodomor happened prior to the holocaust in the world history. What was the holodomor? The holodomor, sometimes specified as the famine-genocide was the man-made famine in the Soviet Ukraine during 1932-1933 that killed around 12 million people of starvation. Since 2006, including Ukraine 15 other countries have recognized the holodomor as genocide carried out by the Soviet government. Recently, the United Nations stated that “Yemen is on brink of ‘world’s worst famine in 100 years’ if war continues”. So, is today’s world facing another holodomor in Yemen? Are we even concerned about the Yemeni children who are on the verge of a serious famine? Let us know what the Yemeni people are actually facing.
Yemen War:
The civil war that has been persisting in Yemen since 2015 has its root in the Arab spring. Ali Abdullah Saleh, the longest serving ruler of Yemen who ruled for three decades since 1978 was compelled to hand over power to his deputy Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi. In 2011, following mass protests, Saleh signed a deal contracted by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to step down from power and hand over to Hadi. However, the fighting reached at the pick point when in 2014, The Houthi movement championed by the Yemen’s Zaidi Shia Muslim minority took the advantage of the newly inaugurated president’s weakness and thus, occupied the northern heartland of Saada province and neighbouring areas. Taking control over the capital Sanaa, the Houtis forced President Hadi to flee abroad in March 2015. With the involvement of Saudi Arab led coalition, the war was intensified since 2015. In march 2015, the Saudi led coalition of other eight Sunni majority countries–backed by the USA, UK and France started fighting airstrikes against the Houtis and declared to restore the government of President Hadi.
Why There is Famine in Yemen:
In October 2018, the United Nations stated that “Yemen is on brink of ‘world’s worst famine in 100 years’ if war continues” which indicates the time frame from 1918 to till date. The UN also mentioned that half the population of Yemen is under  the threat of famine and starvation while the total population of Yemen is 27.5 million. Accusing the airstrikes led by the Saudi Arabia, the UN warned to halt the war to resist the worst form of the famine. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) which assesses food crises worldwide published a report on Yemen in December this year. The report categorized 11 million Yemenis under phase 3 of a five-stage scale for hunger. Another 5 million were considered to be in phase 4, an “emergency” situation, while about 65,000 were in “catastrophe” conditions or phase 5. Save the Children figured out that approximately 5 million Yemeni children are in danger of dying from starvation.
The 100 Years’ Time Frame:
Let us go back to the chronological events that happened during the last 100 years. Starting with the end of a world war, the 100 years timespan includes the Armenian genocide (Apr 1915 – Oct 1923), the very first genocide of the 20th century that killed around 2 million Armenians by the young Turks. Right after the Armenian genocide, the holodomor happened with the killing of 12 million people. The world history experienced brutality of another world war during which the genocidal act was committed by the Nazi party against the Jewish people. About 6 million Jews were murdered under the “final solution” policy imposed by Adolf Hitler. With the end of the Second World War, the world was divided into two blocs–the USA bloc and the Soviet Union bloc. During the cold war era, China was emerging and there was a Chinese revolution in 1949 by which the communist party came into power and took over China. The great leap forward of Mao to transform the Chinese agrarian society into a socialist one resulted the great famine of China which killed almost 40 million people of starvation. The Bangladesh genocide led by the Pakistani army took place in 1971. Considered to be one of the worst kind of genocides, the death toll of the 1971 genocide was as high as three million. Remaining in a cold war with the USA, the Soviet Union could not survive and collapsed in the 1990s. Right after the demise of the Soviet Union, the world experienced the horrific nature of ethnic rivalry such as–the 1994 Rwandan genocide in which 800,000 people were killed within just 100 days. The 1995 Bosnian genocide is another example of ethnic cleansing. The latest genocide or the first genocide of the 21st century is the Darfur genocide in which hundreds of thousands of Sudanese in Darfur were killed & displaced. And now we have the worst form of famine genocide happening in Yemen.
Intent vs. the Number Politics:
Whenever we talk about genocide, the discussion comes to an end with the number of people killed in the heinous act of genocide. However, the fact is that genocide has nothing to do with number. According to the 1948 “Genocide Convention”, the emphasis is given on “intent” rather than number. In Yemen, the situation became worse after the Saudi led coalition intended to weaken the Houtis who are supposed to be backed by Iran. Thus, it can be assumed that the involvement of Saudi Arab and Iran is derived by their own interest and hence, they are worsening the situation in Yemen. In accordance with the intent of genocide, it can be concluded that the Yemen famine is an outcome of the confrontation of Iran and the Saudi led coalition both of who want to resist each other with their own intention.
Way Forward:
Genocide is known as the crime of all crimes. It is considered to be as the most heinous act committed by some human beings against human beings. The world has already experienced so many events of genocide including the holocaust type and the holodomor type. The international community should at least now show some guts to stop another holodomor in Yemen. Already the international community has failed to halt the Rohingya genocide. Let us not experience another kind of holodomor of 16 million people in Yemen.
Rumi Akter is the Research Assistant (International Affairs), Bangladesh Institute of Law and International Affairs (BILIA)