‘Looming disaster’: Oil ship leak threatens millions of Yemenis

Houthi rebels have been accused of delaying a solution to the stricken oil tanker crisis to gain politically.

An oil spill involving a deteriorating tanker moored off the coast of Yemen could potentially disrupt food and water supplies for millions of people in the conflict-ridden country, as well as further afield, in an environmental catastrophe that would be felt across the region.

A team of researchers from Stanford University, Harvard University, and UC Berkeley released the findings of their models on the impact of an oil spill from the FSO Safer in a paper published on Monday in the Nature Sustainability journal.

The researchers stressed urgent action was required to stop a “looming disaster” that would affect an estimated nine million people who would be without drinking water, and shut down Yemen’s main ports, thereby worsening the country’s humanitarian crisis.