Yemenis return home after ‘mercy flight’ to Jordan to undergo treatment: UN

Yemenis who were airlifted to Jordan to undergo treatment for critical illnesses earlier this year were brought home on Sunday on a flight into the Houthi-held capital Sanaa, the United Nations said.

Thirty-one men, women and children in dire need of medical care were flown out in February along with their companions.

“A UN flight carrying civilian Yemenis & their companions just landed in #Sanaa,” the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a tweet, without saying how many had returned.

“Thanks to the UN medical air bridge, the patients received treatment in #Jordan for different chronic conditions for which they could not be treated inside #Yemen.”

The UN organised two evacuation flights to Amman in February, the first carrying seven children and the second with 24 other patients.

The return of the medical flight comes shortly after the warring sides in Yemen’s long conflict agreed to exchange 1,081 prisoners, after talks in Switzerland.