UN envoy Angelina Jolie in Yemen ahead of fundraising summit

The Hollywood actress, who is special envoy for the UN on refugee issues, landed in the southern coastal city of Aden to meet families and refugees there

Also on Sunday, an armed group kidnapped two foreigners working with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Yemen’s east, a government source said

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UNHCR special envoy Angelina Jolie shakes hands with a woman displaced by war during a visit to the southern province of Lahej, Yemen on March 6. Photo: Reuters

Published: 1:05am, 7 Mar 2022Updated: 3:39am, 7 Mar 2022

Hollywood actress Angelina Jolie on Sunday visited war-ravaged Yemen to show solidarity with displaced families in hopes of mobilising support for an incoming fundraising conference, the United Nations said.

Jolie, who is special envoy for the UN on refugee issues, landed in the southern coastal city of Aden to meet families and refugees there. Aden is the seat of the internationally recognised government.

The UN refugee agency said it hopes that Jolie’s visit would draw attention to growing humanitarian needs in Yemen, the Arab World’s poorest country, ahead of the annual High Level Pledging Conference for Yemen on March 16.

“As we continue to watch the horrors unfolding in Ukraine and call for an immediate end to the conflict and humanitarian access, I am here in Yemen to support people who also desperately need peace. The situation here is one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world,” Jolie said in a post on her Instagram account.

United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) staff members stand with children at a camp for the internally displaced north of Yemen’s southern city of Aden on March 6. Photo: AFP

Also on Sunday, an armed group kidnapped two foreigners working with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Yemen’s east, a government source said, as the charity confirmed it had “lost contact” with some staff.

“An armed group kidnapped two MSF workers, one a German national and the other Mexican, in Hadramawt,” a Yemeni interior ministry source told Agence France-Presse, adding that a “military campaign” was underway to track down the kidnappers.