Medical evacuation flights from capital

Flights transporting Yemeni medical patients from rebel-held areas continued yesterday when a second plane carrying 24 patients took off from Sanaa bound for Jordan’s capital, the UN health agency said.

The UN flights, which began on February 3, are seen as a humanitarian breakthrough in the more than 5-year-old conflict in the Arab world’s poorest country. The conflict began with the 2014 takeover of the capital Sanaa by the rebel Houthis, who control much of the country’s north.

A Saudi-led military coalition allied with Yemen’s internationally recognised government has been fighting the Iranbacked Houthis since 2015. The US-backed coalition closed the airspace and prevented any flights from leaving Sanaa, starting in August 2016.

The Associated Press reported in November that Saudi Arabia and the Houthis are holding indirect, behind-the-scenes talks to end the war mediated by Oman, quoting officials from both sides.

The talks are focused on interim agreements, such as reopening Yemen’s main international airport in Sanaa, which was shut down by the Saudi-led coalition in 2016.

There has been no announced explanation for the medical flights but they could be a result of talks between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis. The first such flight since the air blockade carrying eight patients and their families left Sanaa on February 3.

Yesterday’s flight was originally scheduled to depart Sanaa the previous day. However it did not take off ‘‘for technical reasons,’’ the World Health Organisation said on Saturday, without giving details.

Twenty-four patients and their family members ‘‘have departed on the second flight today from Sanaa to Amman to receive the treatment,’’ the WHO tweeted.

Among those who left Sanaa yesterday was 30-year-old cancer patient Entisar. WHO said the cancer had spread all over her body. ‘‘The physical & psychological pain is unbearable; all I want is to feel better,’’ she was quoted as saying by the UN agency. Her last name was not given.

Welcoming the arrival of the second flight to Jordan’s capital, Amman, UN envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths said the two flights transported patients to ‘‘receive life-saving medical care currently unavailable in Yemen.’’

The Houthi rebels criticised the U.N. for the delay of the second flight and for the small number of patients airlifted out of Sanaa. The rebel-run health ministry has said that 32,000 people are in need of urgent medical and surgical intervention, such as kidney transplants and heart surgeries. –AP