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Yemen: Red Cross chief checks out cholera-hit war zone

INTERNATIONAL Committee of the Red Cross head Peter Maurer made a rare visit to the front lines in Yemen yesterday, taking a dirt road to reach the besieged western city of Taiz.

His visit was intended to get a first-hand look at Yemen’s raging cholera epidemic and the humanitarian disaster amid the Saudi-led intervention into the country’s civil war.

Mr Maurer has already visited the southern port city of Aden and will be ending his trip in Sanaa.

He posted a video showing him driving on unpaved roads to Taiz and tweeted: “The city is encircled and main roads are cut off.”

The Red Cross head has already accused the world of “sleepwalking into yet more tragedy.”

Taiz, which was once Yemen’s cultural centre, has been divided into areas controlled by the Shi’ite Houthi rebels and their allies and those controlled by factions financed and armed by the Saudi-led coalition.

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