Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I support and welcome the motion. I congratulate her on bringing it forward. It is no harm to read into the record of the House as quickly as I can the scale of the crisis in figures from the UN and various agencies working with it. A total of 22.2 million people, which is 75% of the population, have a level of need. There are 2 million displaced persons, 89% of whom have been displaced for more than a year. There are a total of 280,000 refugees and asylum seekers. Up to 14 million people are at risk of severe food insecurity. A total of 400,000 children are suffering from severe and acute malnutrition.Between 1.8 million and 2.8 million children could suffer from severe food insecurity, while 2,500 people have been infected with cholera. These are some of the headline figures that show the scale of the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. The Minister of State outlined in the Dáil recently that the Irish response to this in financial terms is generous, with €4 million provided this year and €22 million over the past several years. We ought to support the EU initiatives in this regard. I exhort the Minister of State to continue that level of funding and, if anything, increase it. The Irish people would support such an initiative.

I am strongly in favour of the peace process in Yemen which the Government is actively supporting. There were encouraging developments in Sweden several weeks ago regarding the scaling down of military activity and a move towards peace. The ceasefire in the port of Al-Hudaydah is a welcome part of that process. It is a complex question with many factions involved. There are also factions both within the Government and the Houthi forces. Various studies suggest there are war profiteers in both groupings, further complicating the situation.

We support the peace efforts. We cannot escape the fact that it is imperative for the US to keep pressure on in the context of these peace efforts. However ,that pressure needs to be stepped up. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates must de-escalate their involvement, cease bombing the civilian population and scale down their military activity in Yemen. Our Government needs to be in active pursuit of that, directly with the US and within the EU. We must say to our neighbours in the UK that the sale of arms to the coalition is not appropriate because there are alleged war crimes taking place. It has been stated by several leading individuals in the British Government that if they were to establish clear evidence of war crimes, it would cease to sell arms. That needs to happen.

What is needed is a negotiated settlement. Despite the factionalisation of the conflict and the various subgroups involved, to get the main people involved in the conflict to agree to a ceasefire and a settlement is important. Fine Gael strongly supports Senator Higgins’s motion. We also call for the stepping up of humanitarian assistance and of diplomatic pressure with the UK, the US and within the EU.