A displaced community has been able to return home after one of Project Masam’s demining teams located and cleared Houthi 10 anti-tank mines that had fuelled civilian exodus. Team 17, led by Hassan Al-Ghouri, was called and dispatched after a landmine exploded on 6 July when displaced farmers were clearing an area to plant trees…
After Project Masam’s Team 4 cleared a minefield in a liberated area in Marib governorate, local children arrived on the clearance site asking if they could play football in the river bed. The team had been called following two accidents in which a goat herder lost a leg and one of his goats was killed.…
Ali Ahmed Abdullah was displaced when the conflict reached his village. When his area was liberated, he decided to return home. Ali did not know the land had been heavily mined by Houthis militias before it was liberated. As he looked forward to normalcy and settling back in his home after a long period of…
Like many farmers living in the resource-rich eastern Shabwah governorate, Abdullah Abdul Qadir was left fearing a landmine might end his life and that of his livestock. In 2015, the region and its Bayhan Directorate became a battleground between the Houthis and Pro-Yemeni government forces. As they retreated, the Houthis left behind landmines, unexploded ordnance and…
Radwan Zaid Ibrahim was only a child when a landmine explosion shattered his leg. Now in his teens, Radwan told Project Masam how the blast affected his life: he walks with difficulty and can no longer play or work. Luckily, after Project Masam heard of the presence of landmines in Radwan’s area, demining teams entered…
Like hundreds of victims of landmines in Yemen, Amina Ibrahim was walking near her village when a mine exploded under her feet. “After the mine exploded, I didn’t feel anything anymore,” Amina told Project Masam from her home. Her right leg was amputated and she now wears a prosthetic leg to help her move around.…
Thousands of Yemeni lives are shattered by shrapnel wounds each year. Mahfouz Thabet, who is in his teens, was working in the fields when he triggered the mine detonating mechanism. The landmine projected metal fragments. “I was grazing cattle and I ran over a mine which exploded immediately,” he told Project Masam. “The mine exploded,…
Iman Ibrahim is a shy six-year-old. Unlike many other girls her age, Iman doesn’t dream of toys; her dream is for her limbs to work again. She was only little when a landmine exploded under her. Her right leg was badly damaged, the skin and muscles burnt and torn. Iman’s left arm was blown to…
In Yemen, children make up for a large proportion of all victims of landmines, unexploded ordnance and improvised explosive devices. Hammam, Anhar and Wijdan are sadly some of the thousands of children whose life has been altered by mines. “We went out for a walk in the vicinity of Al Jufina [Ma’arib governorate]. One of…
