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Yemen’s Unprecedented Humanitarian Crisis: Implications for International Humanitarian Law, the Geneva Convention, and the Future of Global Health Security

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 August 2016

Alba Ripoll Gallardo ,
Frederick M. Burkle Jr. ,
Luca Ragazzoni  and
Francesco Della Corte
Alba Ripoll Gallardo*
Affiliation:
CRIMEDIM-Research Center in Emergency and Disaster Medicine, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy
Frederick M. Burkle Jr.
Affiliation:
Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard School of Public Health, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Luca Ragazzoni
Affiliation:
CRIMEDIM-Research Center in Emergency and Disaster Medicine, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy
Francesco Della Corte
Affiliation:
CRIMEDIM-Research Center in Emergency and Disaster Medicine, Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara, Italy
*
Correspondence and reprint requests to Alba Ripoll Gallardo, Via Lanino 1, PC 8100 Novara, Italy (e-mail: alba.ripoll@med.uniupo.it).
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Abstract

The current humanitarian crisis in Yemen is unprecedented in many ways. The Yemeni War tragedy is symptomatic of gross failures to recognize, by combatants, existing humanitarian law and the Geneva Convention that have become the new norm in unconventional armed conflicts and are increasingly replicated in Africa, Afghanistan, and other areas of the Middle East with dire consequences on aid workers and the noncombatant population. The health and humanitarian professions must take collective responsibility in calling for all belligerent parties to cease the massacre and commit to guaranteed medical assistance, humanitarian aid, and the free flow of information and respect for the humanitarian principles that protect the neutrality and impartiality of the humanitarian workforce. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2016;page 1 of 3)

Keywords

Yemenhumanitarian crisisinternational humanitarian lawGeneva Conventionwar
Type
Commentary
Information
Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness , Volume 10 , Issue 5 , October 2016 , pp. 701 - 703
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, Inc. 2016 

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