Yemenis struggle without internet for third day after air strikes

24 Jan, 2022

SANAA: Most of Yemen faced a third day without internet on Sunday after air strikes on the Red Sea city of Hodeidah, the main landing point for the country’s undersea web connection, damaged its telecoms infrastructure.

In the capital Sanaa, Majid Abdullah said he was unable to receive money from relatives in Saudi Arabia at an exchange office as a result of the ongoing outage.

Seven years of conflict have divided Yemen between an internationally-recognised government based in the southern city of Aden, and the Iran-aligned Houthi group in Sanaa.

“I don’t know what to do. We eat and drink from the (money sent by) expatriates abroad,” he said.

The war in Yemen has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions, while economic collapse has pushed millions into poverty and parts of the country to the brink of famine.

The government’s communications ministry said on Sunday that it was ready to re-connect territory under its control via another undersea cable which lands in Aden, where parts of the city still have internet services. Some organisations have access to satellite internet.

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