AL-MUKALLA: The Arab coalition announced on Sunday that it had carried out 19 air raids over the past day, killing 100 Houthi fighters and destroying 14 military vehicles in Marib province.

On the ground, heavy fighting between government troops and Houthis broke out on Saturday and Sunday outside the city of Marib, local official and media reports said.

The heaviest fighting was recorded in Juba district, south of Marib, where the Houthis intensified attacks in a bid to overwhelm the government’s defenses on a strategic mountain range that overlooks parts of the city.

The Houthis failed to register any territorial gains on Sunday and were forced to retreat after suffering heavy losses, officials said.

Thousands of combatants and civilians have been killed since February when the Houthis renewed an offensive to seize control of the energy-rich city, the government’s last bastion in the north.

Separately, Iran’s ambassador in the Houthi-held Yemeni capital, Sanaa, departed the city on Saturday onboard an Iraqi medical aircraft, the movement’s spokesperson and local media said.

Mohammed Abdul Salam said that a successful Iraqi mediation between Iran and Saudi Arabia led to the medical evacuation of Hassan Erlo through Sanaa airport, denying media reports about tensions between the movement and Iran and rumors that he was wounded in airstrikes by the Arab coalition.

“An Iranian-Saudi understanding through Baghdad led to the evacuation of the the Iranian ambassador to Sanaa on an Iraqi plane due to his health condition,” Salam said on Twitter.

In Tehran, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said that its ambassador was flown back home after contracting COVID-19 during his stay in the capital.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that the Houthis sent a request to the Arab coalition to permit the evacuation of the Iranian ambassador, a move that was interpreted as suggesting a possible rift between the Yemeni rebels and Iran.

Hassan Erlo, an officer in Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, traveled to Yemen in October last year and was later named as Iran’s ambassador to the Houthis.

Yemeni officials and experts believe that Erlo orchestrated the militia’s deadly offensive to capture the central city of Marib and also commanded other Iranian, Iraqi and Lebanese officers who provided the rebels with military guidance.

LONDON: The UAE said it will restrict entry into all government institutions to people vaccinated against coronavirus and those who are exempted from getting the vaccine, state news agency WAM reported on Sunday. 
The Ministry of Health and Prevention, in coordination with the National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority, made the announcement in line with the UAE’s COVID-19 recovery drive and efforts to ensure public safety. 
“All federal government employees and the public seeking federal government services nationwide are required to follow the Green Pass Protocol on Al Hosn app effective Jan. 3, to have access to federal entities,” the statement on WAM said.
Employees and individuals requiring entry into government buildings must take a PCR test every 14 days, to maintain the “green status” in the app. Those who have been exempt from receiving the vaccine must take a PCR test every seven days, while children aged under 16 will not be required to undergo any COVID tests.
The ministry said “unvaccinated individuals and those with ‘grey status’ on the Al Hosn app will not be allowed access to federal government entities.”
It also called on the public to obtain the booster shot to ensure raising societal immunity in light of the spread of new COVID-19 variants.

CAIRO/BEIRUT: World health chiefs issued a new warning on Saturday over the threat posed by the omicron coronavirus variant, as Egypt recorded its first cases of the strain and Lebanon imposed a curfew on non-vaccinated people.

Omicron has been reported in 89 countries and the number of cases is doubling in one-and-a-half to three days, the World Health Organization said.

The variant is spreading rapidly in countries with high levels of immunity, but it is not known if this is because of its ability to evade immunity, its inherent increased transmissibility or a combination of both, the agency said. “There is still limited data on the clinical severity of omicron,” the WHO said.

“More data is needed to understand the severity profile and how severity is impacted by vaccination and existing immunity. There is still no peer-reviewed evidence of vaccine efficacy for omicron.”

The WHO warned that hospitals in some countries could not cope.

“Hospital admissions in the UK and South Africa continue to rise, and given rapidly increasing case counts, it is possible that many healthcare systems may become quickly overwhelmed.”

In the US, fears are growing in New York of a return to the nightmare of 2020, when the city was the global center of the pandemic. “Omicron happened,” New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said.

“And we got to be honest about the fact that it’s moving very fast and we have to move faster,” he added. In Europe, edgy governments are bringing back restrictions to fight the pandemic, which has killed more than 5 million people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019.

Paris canceled its annual New Year fireworks, EU chief Ursula von der Leyen warned that omicron could be the dominant variant in Europe by mid-January, Ireland is ordering bars and restaurants to close at 8 p.m., Denmark is shutting cinemas and other venues and London Mayor Sadiq Khan declared a “major incident” to allow institutions more leeway in tackling the upsurge.

Egypt recorded its first three cases of omicron on Saturday, at the height of the economically vital tourist season. Three Egyptians tested positive on their return from overseas, the Health Ministry said. The tourism sector, which suffered under global lockdowns for the past two years, had just started to recover and was counting on end-of-year visitors.

Lebanon has recorded 60 cases of omicron, but Health Minister Firass Abiad said it was “rapidly spreading … two-and-a-half times faster than the delta variant.”

Security services have imposed a three-week 5 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew for unvaccinated residents, with fines for those who break it.

KHARTOUM: Tear gas was fired at thousands of supporters of Sudan’s opposition Forces for Freedom and Change movement who had gathered in the capital Khartoum on Friday, witnesses said. The source of the tear gas was unclear. The witnesses told Reuters there was no sign of police officers at the scene.
Mass protests erupted following a military coup in October. They have continued following a deal announced on Nov. 21 in which the military reinstated Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, who had been under house arrest.
The agreement between Hamdok and the military faces opposition from protesters who previously saw Hamdok as a symbol of resistance to military rule and denounced it as a betrayal.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Twitter: “Many Sudanese people continue to demand respect for their basic human rights and to voice their enduring aspiration for a democratic Sudan. The US continues to stand with them.”
Khalid Omar Youssef, minister of Cabinet affairs prior to the coup and prominent opposition figure who was arrested and released after the military took over, was on stage speaking to the crowds when the tear gas was fired.
Youssef then tweeted saying that “whether they fire tear gas or bullets on us, they will not silence us … we will defeat the coup and our people will regain their freedom.”
Other leading opposition figures were scheduled to speak. Live footage aired by Sudan’s Congress party following the tear gas firing showed seats haphazardly scattered.

ANKARA: Long queues in major cities for cheap bread are not the only sign of the financial pains that Turkish households are experiencing after prices skyrocketed in recent months.

Ilhami Isik, a Kurdish intellectual and writer originally from the southeastern province of Batman, has lent a helping hand to 14,000 families by helping clear around 40,000 bills worth TRY6.1 million ($0.3 million) over the last three years.

“The number of bills keeps growing over years and they come from all over the country, especially from the middle-income and low-income families of Istanbul and southeastern province of Diyarbakir,” Isik told Arab News.

People reach out to him through social media and he shares photos of the bills, requesting philanthropists to come forward and help the poor clear their bills. It is mostly medium-income families and a small number of businessmen who come forward to help.

“Amid rising price of utilities, the bill is not just a bill. It is something that sometimes triggers a divorce, a suicide or causes a child to sleep with an empty stomach. The ability to pay the bill is the main indicator for a family to keep its members alive and healthy for that month,” he said.

Due to the country’s serious economic problems and rising living costs of living in the country, where official inflation rates have reached 21.3 percent, more and more families are calling him for help.  

“Sometimes I’m having trouble to find necessary financial means to pay them, but I’ll keep my project going on. We are receiving at least 30 requests per day. It sometimes reaches 50 bills. Families are tearing apart. Children are facing unbelievable traumas due to poverty. Sometimes a bill that I pay discourages a dad from committing suicide when he sees his child freezing in the house after the electricity or natural gas is cut.”

To some, helping people pay their bills may not sound like a sustainable project because, as the saying goes, if they give a man a fish, they have to feed him for a day, but if they teach a man how to fish, they will feed him for a lifetime.

“But my only concern right now is to keep these people alive,” Isik explains. “Finding them jobs is part of a political mechanism. It is the duty of the public welfare authorities to do that. I just want to make sure that these children keep healthy and happy without being under the stress of financial strains. Sometimes a mother calls me and says that they all slept well the day before because they don’t have to be concerned about their bills. It is my only concern.”

It is mostly women who reach out to Isik, as men will not take the initiative out of shame.

His social responsibility projects began in 2014, when he spontaneously initiated a countrywide campaign dubbed “Let’s Prevent Children From Feeling Cold.” 

The project lasted two years and Isik provided about 84,000 children, including refugees, with new and clean coats. Several well-known Turkish brands sent him truckloads of clothes in the eastern and southeastern provinces.

Sky-high bills have been on the agenda of households for some time. Over the last two years, electricity prices have increased by 47 percent and gas prices by 42 percent. Electricity prices have increased by 21.9 percent so far this year.

Istanbul and Ankara municipalities have launched social solidarity campaigns, such as “Bill Pending,” to help thousands of needy families who are having difficulties in paying their utility bills.

This year, Ankara municipality helped several families to clear their electricity bills. Official sources from the municipality told Arab News that, in 2021, more than 98,000 bills worth TRY4.7 million were paid with contributions from the city’s philanthropists.