Land mines shatter young lives in Yemen

HAJJAH, Yemen－For 12-year-old Raed Gerbhi, a terrible explosion on a cold December day in Yemen's northern province of Hajjah left an indelible mark in his life. What started out as a normal day to herd sheep together with his friends ended in tragedy.

Without warning, a land mine exploded under Gerbhi's feet, blowing off his right leg and wounding his hands. His three friends were knocked meters away by the shock wave, but miraculously escaped from the explosion unscathed.

Residents of Bani Faid village said the government army sent a demining team and military unit to cordon off the area, along with an ambulance which took Gerbhi and his parents to a nearby hospital and then the Saudi Arabian city of Jazan for treatment.

Two months later, Gerbhi returned home with his parents after recovering from his injuries. Gerbhi, who loves playing soccer, lost his right leg.

"My friends were standing a couple of meters away, and they survived the explosion. I remembered them calling my name: 'Raed, Raed'… Then I saw blood running from my body and I lost consciousness," said Gerbhi, wearing a soccer jersey of his favorite club Juventus.

Gerbhi is just one of the many Yemeni children maimed or killed by land mines in Hajjah, once a fierce battleground for Yemeni government forces and Houthi rebels.

In a more tragic accident, Abdullah, another child in the nearby village, was killed by a land mine last month while grazing sheep.

"I found my son after three days of searching in the desert. I found him dead on the ground and some parts of his body were scattered," said Shuei Bilal, a local villager.

Yearslong civil war

Yemen's civil war began in late 2014 when the Houthi militia seized control of several northern provinces and forced the Saudi-backed government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi out of the capital Sanaa.

The Yemeni army recaptured Midi district from Houthi militia in April 2018. Demining teams spent months clearing large swathes of the area before allowing residents to return from internally displaced camps.

Despite these efforts, local authorities said mines hidden under the sand dunes have since killed 20 people in Midi.

Military experts said most of the land mines are made of tough plastic and not affected by rain, hot or cold weather, so they can stay effective for years.

"In 2021, we cleared 5,000 mines of various shapes from nearby farms and pastures in the northwestern parts of Hajjah," Sayyaf al-Wazei, of the demining department in the Engineering Division, told Xinhua.

Xinhua