According to the United Nations the civil war in Yemen is the worst humanitarian disaster of our time. An interview on welt.de with the Yemeni foreign minister brings back own memories.
„Children learn arithmetic by adding Americans and Jews killed.“
Ahmad Awad Bin Mubarak, Außenminister Jemen
For a long time before the war, I was able to marvel at the beautiful landscape and architecture of Yemen and smoke shisha, or hookah, on a homestead in the mountains with the women of the landlord.
Near Hajja ©Rebecca Hillauer
In a village I was greeted by the ten children of a man – by two wives. And on a lonely mountain road I met a girl with prominent eyebrows and serious look, whose name has unfortunately escaped me. A shepherd girl held a black lamb in her arms.
Girl in the mountains ©Rebecca Hillauer
Shepherd girl near Jibla ©Rebecca Hillauer
I also met Ali and his brothers and tasted locusts that a man was selling in the market in Sanaa.
Ali and his brothers, Hajja ©Rebecca Hillauer
Man selling locusts ©Rebecca Hillauer
At that time, Yemen, like Germany, was still divided: in the north, the conservative Arab Republic of Yemen, and in the south, the socialist People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen. I stayed in the northern part. Only twenty years later, on my second trip in December 2009, I was able to go to the south as well. I visited and reported about a refugee camp for people from Somalia who had escaped the radical Islamic Shebaab. Yemen itself was considered an al-Qaeda base.
In the port city of Aden, I witnessed the premiere of the cult musical “Linie 1” by Berlin’s Gripstheater – transposed to Arab conditions. What the Yemeni director and the actors told me about their lives and their view of their country, I described in a feature for German radio.
In 2011, shortly after the “Arab Spring,” I interviewed political scientist Khaled Fattah about the upheavals in Yemen for the Swiss Weekly Newspaper. Two years later, the civil war began.