NEW YORK: UN aid chief Mark Lowcock will on Thursday urge the United States to reverse its plan to designate Yemen's Houthi group as a foreign terrorist organization, warning the move would push the country into a "famine on a scale that we have not seen for nearly forty years."

In a planned briefing to the UN Security Council, seen by Reuters, Lowcock will also say that a US plan to issue licenses and exemptions to aid agencies will not prevent a famine in Yemen.