Drinking water supplies dwindle in Yemeni city besieged by Houthi rebels

FILE - Smoke rises after an attack by Houthi rebels on the city of Taiz, Yemen, on Oct. 21, 2015. (AP Photo/Abdulnasser Alseddik, File) Abdulnasser Alseddik/AP hide caption

Drinking water has been scarce for over a decade in Taiz, but the problem has reached crisis levels in recent weeks as Iran-backed Houthi rebels besiege Yemen's third-largest city in their escalating conflict with government forces.

The needs of Taiz's more than 1 million residents are now barely being met, humanitarian groups say, as access to wells is limited, desalination plants run low on fuel and water delivery trucks are largely prevented from entering the city.

Families are rationing every drop. Before Taiz came under siege, Hadil al-Shahid and her two young children used about 10 liters (about 2.6 gallons) of bottled water per day for drinking and cooking; now they are making the same amount last about four days.

"We stopped drinking coffee and tea, which we used to drink daily," al-Shahid said in a phone interview.

Families like al-Shahid's are paying as much as 75% more for bottled water than just a few weeks ago, and some have begun to buy water on credit.

The siege of Taiz — a strategic gateway to southern Yemen — isn't only constricting water supplies. Shortages of groceries have sent food prices soaring. Fuel is also in short supply, making it difficult to maintain basic services such as hospitals and sanitation, which compounds the public health risks.

Amnesty International has called on the Houthis to immediately open roads into the city, saying Taiz is being pushed to "the brink of a severe humanitarian disaster."

Houthis strangle Taiz, cut off residents' access to wells

Yemen descended into civil war in 2014, when the Houthis seized much of the country's north, including the capital of Sanaa, and forced the internationally recognized government into exile. Taiz has been a focal point of fighting ever since.

War-related damage to Taiz's aging water infrastructure magnified the pressures of population growth and frequent droughts that led to shrinking supplies of groundwater. Residents began paying for water delivered by trucks, a mostly reliable alternative — until recently.

By August, Yemen had become a widening front in the Iran war. The Houthis ramped up their advance on Taiz last month, after a lightning-fast capture of the port city of Mokha, an area about 130 kilometers (80 miles) away that is vital to controlling shipping through the Red Sea.

As Houthi forces took control of more land and roads surrounding Taiz, residents' access to nearby wells was cut off and deliveries of water from outside the city declined.

The truckers that have managed to ferry water into Taiz have in some cases tripled their rates to make the perilous journey.

As Taiz's fuel supplies dwindle, its water utility is struggling to maintain limited operations and desalination plants are running well below capacity.

The city is also enduring shortages of fuel and food

Since August, Taiz province, which includes the city and surrounding areas, has taken in roughly half of those displaced from other parts of Yemen because of the fighting — an estimated 124,000 people, according to the United Nations' migration experts. That is only compounding the pressure on Taiz's limited supply of water and other necessities.

Some displaced families are now living in makeshift shelters or tents and surviving on one meal a day, said Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for a division of the United Nations that focuses on emergency aid.

Fuel for cooking and transportation has also become scarce — and more expensive. The price of cooking gas has more than quadrupled, according to Hani Bafaqih, a water, sanitation and hygiene expert at the aid organization CARE in Yemen. To get by, some families are cooking over fires made by burning wood, charcoal or cardboard.

These fuel shortages have made it harder for community kitchens to provide free hot meals to families and have also forced waste-collection services to shut down.

"The shortages feed into each other. Without fuel, water pumps, hospital generators and solid-waste collection stop. With less clean water and waste piling up, the risk of disease, including cholera, rises," Laerke said. The health risks are exacerbated by thirsty families tapping into unprotected wells that could be contaminated with waterborne diseases, he said.

Food prices are also soaring. Flour and rice are about 50% more expensive than they were over the summer, according to aid groups, and fruits and vegetables are hard to find.

Ahmed Abdel Gaber is living with nine other family members in the ruins of another building after being displaced from their home by the fighting. He used to earn money hauling construction material, but that income is no longer steady and his family is barely scraping by.

"We heavily rely on assistance and donations from people to get food," he said in a phone interview.

Al-Shahid, a hair salon owner, said her income also dried up a few weeks ago. The salon was forced to close as former customers began to prioritize their spending on food and water. Her 10-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son now eat mostly rice, bread and cheese, she said.

While the Yemeni government still controls the center of Taiz, the siege is making it difficult to deliver supplies to its forces there. In the hills surrounding Taiz, the government forces are trying to repel the Houthis but face stiff resistance, especially east of the city.

Gaining control of Taiz city is vital to the Houthis if they seek to advance south toward Aden and Lahj, analysts say, but that won't be easy.

"Any Houthi attempt to seize parts of the city, let alone take it entirely, would likely require a prolonged and costly battle, with significant casualties among Houthi fighters," said Ahmed Nagi, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group.

Three Houthi officials said the rebel group controls roughly 80% of the countryside surrounding Taiz and several key neighborhoods inside the city. The Associated Press couldn't independently verify the claims by these officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren't allowed to brief the media, but Yemen's foreign minister, Afrah al-Zouba, has acknowledged the rebel group's tightening grip on the city.

The Houthis' fight for control of the city is made significantly more difficult because of its large civilian population, the officials said.

Earlier this week, missiles fired by the Houthis struck a residential area in Taiz, killing two teenage girls and renewing attention on the dangers faced by civilians.

Abdel Gaber said he can hear loud explosions every day from fighting that is happening roughly 5 kilometers (3 miles) away. The family isn't returning to their home in a mountain village out of concern for their safety.

Leaving Taiz is not an option for al-Shahid because the costs of travel and renting a home in another province are prohibitive.

"Staying in our home is inevitable — whether it be a matter of life or death," al-Shahid said.

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