UK urged to help British-Yemeni families stuck in warzone

By Emma Batha

LONDON, July 21 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - British Yemenis have accused the UK government of turning its back on hundreds of British citizens trapped in Yemen's civil war.

On Tuesday two British lawmakers will submit a petition to parliament highlighting the plight of UK nationals stranded amid one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

More than 3,000 people have been killed and 1.2 million displaced in a conflict between Houthi rebels and forces loyal to President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who has fled to Saudi Arabia. Four fifths of the population need help, the U.N. says.

Many British Yemenis are stuck in the conflict along with their British children because their spouse is a Yemeni national and does not have an entry visa for Britain.

Their predicament has been compounded by the closure of foreign embassies in Yemen, making it almost impossible to obtain a visa or to travel to a third country to apply for one.

"I feel devastated that there's clearly a war going on and there are hundreds of British people stuck there and the British government has turned a blind eye," said Kamal Mashjari whose British brother and two British nieces are among those trapped.

The Shi'ite Muslim Houthis seized the capital Sanaa in September and pushed into Yemen's south and east in March and April in what they say is a revolution against a corrupt government and hardline Sunni Muslim militants.

Saudi Arabia is leading a Sunni coalition that has carried out air strikes since late March in support of Hadi, which aid workers say has worsened the humanitarian situation in Yemen.

The petition calls for Britain to ease visa requirements for the immediate families of British Yemenis and help evacuate the most vulnerable people, including the elderly and young.

Mashjari cited one case where a British national was forced to leave his two-year-old son in Yemen with his grandparents when he returned to Britain with his wife. He has since been told the toddler must travel to the British embassy in Egypt to be fingerprinted before he can get a visa.

"Yemen is in the middle of a civil war and Britain is tying people up in red tape and bureaucracy on an epic scale," said Mashjari, who initiated the petition.

Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office did not comment on any specific cases but said it had been advising against all travel to Yemen since 2011.

Campaigners said another family who had made it to the British consulate in Jeddah in Saudi Arabia had been told to provide antenatal records to prove their children's identities.

"If someone's house has been bombed they are not exactly going to have these documents," said Lubna Maktari, director of the Independent Yemen Group based in London.

She said many of those stranded are second generation British from families who have fought with the British Army or who served for decades in the Merchant Navy during the British Empire (Stockholm: EMP-B.ST - news) .

Maktari and Mashjari have documented over 100 cases involving several hundred UK nationals, but they believe there are many more unrecorded cases. (Editing by Ros Russell; Please credit the Thomson Reuters (Dusseldorf: TOC.DU - news) Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit www.trust.org)