More than 80 people killed in crush at Ramadan charity event in Yemen

More than 80 people died and several hundred were injured in a crush at an event to distribute financial aid in Yemen's capital Sanaa on Wednesday.

Hundreds of people had gathered at the event organised by merchants without co-ordination with local authorities when the crush happened, leaders of the Houthi rebel group that controls the city said.

Gunfire and an electrical explosion caused the deadly crush, AP reported.

Armed Houthis fired into the air to control the crowd, apparently striking an electrical wire and causing it to explode, according to two witnesses.

A Houthi security official told AFP that at least 85 people were killed and “more than 322” injured, 50 of them seriously.

The Houthi administrators said dozens of casualties were taken to nearby hospitals.

Thirteen people were in critical conditions, according to Houthi Television.

People had crowded into a school to receive the donations, which amounted to 5,000 Yemeni riyals, or about $9 per person, two witnesses involved in the rescue effort told Reuters.

The tragedy was the deadliest in years that was not related to Yemen’s long-standing war.

Aid groups push to feed Yemen's hungry — in pictures

The Houthi-run Interior Ministry said it had detained two organisers and an investigation was under way.

A video posted by Houthi TV on the Telegram messaging app showed a crowd of people squeezed together, some screaming and shouting and reaching out to be pulled to safety.

Brig Abdel Khaleq Al Aghri, a representative of the Houthi ministry, blamed the crush on the “random distribution” of funds without co-ordination with local authorities.

The head of the Houthi supreme revolutionary committee, Mohamed Ali Al Houthi, said the stampede was the result of the Yemeni people suffering “the worst global humanitarian crisis” after eight years of fighting, Reuters reported.

“When the gates opened, the crowd flooded on to the stairs leading to the schoolyard where the distribution was planned,” he said.

The Houthis said they would pay some $2,000 in compensation to each family who lost a relative, while the injured would receive about $400, according to AP.

Yemen has been embroiled in an eight-year civil war that has killed tens of thousands of people, wrecked the economy and pushed millions into hunger.

More than 21 million people in Yemen, or two-thirds of the country’s population, need help and protection, according to the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

The UN envoy to Yemen, Hans Grundberg, said his team was “pained and deeply saddened by the tragic stampede in Sanaa on the eve of Eid”.

“My heartfelt condolences go out to all Yemenis grieving today and I wish the injured a speedy recovery,” Mr Grundberg said in a statement.

Yemen's Minister of Information, Moammar Al Eryani, said the Houthis must take responsibility for the tragedy.

“Responsibility falls on those who plundered the public treasury, and public reserves of the state and suspended salaries eight years ago, disrupted the private sector, and undermined job opportunities for tens of thousands of workers,” he said on Twitter.

This has left people without any source of income to support their families, he said.

“We hold the criminal killers, who brought the situation to this tragic point and turned the lives of millions of Yemenis into hell, fully responsible for this crime,” Mr Al Eryani said.

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