Inside Yemen: Intensive fighting forces many to flee their homes

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04:23

We continue with our series "Inside Yemen". The suffering from the country's bloody civil war has been worsening in its strategic port city of Al Hudaydah. Our correspondent Natalie Carney reports.

NATALIE CARNEY ADEN "One of the flashpoints in Yemen's deadly civil war is the port city of Al Hudaydah, a strategic city on Yemen's red sea coast, through which more than 70% of imports and humanitarian aid was entering the country, making it a lifeline for more than 20 million Yemenis who rely on outside aid to survive."

However earlier this year, The Saudi and Emirati-led coalition launched an attack against the Houthis who control the area, exacerbate an already catastrophic humanitarian situation and causing thousands to flee their homes. That battle continues today.

Yemeni fighters in support of President Abdu Raboo Mansur Hadi prepare for another day on the front line in Yemen's flashpoint city of Al Hudaydah.

The battle for this strategic location between the Saudi coalition backed Yemeni government and Houthi movement has been ongoing since the summer.

On Friday, the Houthis shelled a camp for internally displaced persons killing one, according to local media.

This followed an airstrike by the coalition on a residential building belonging to a prominent Houthi tribal chief. Fierce fighting last week killed at least 27 from both sides in one day.

NATALIE CARNEY ADEN "Hudaydah is the fourth-largest city in Yemen and home to roughly 600,000 people, but the continual fighting and dire humanitarian conditions have forced many to flee and find shelter wherever they can. These tents, mud huts and empty brick shells on the outskirts of Aden are now home to many escaping the frontlines."

Makeshift camps like this one on the outskirts of the southern city of Aden have popped up all across the country.

Not far away we found Aicha Ali and her 6 children. The family, along with her husband, fled Hudaydah two months ago, leaving everything behind.

AICHA ALI INTERNALLY DISPLACED RESIDENT "We even left our cattle there. We had no time to take anything but ourselves. We escaped running. We left at 8 am and we walked. At 2 pm we were still walking. We reached Aden at midnight."

The family was told of this vacated mud hut by fellow Yemenis and are doing their best to make it home, not knowing when, if ever, they will return to Hudaydah.

Nearby Ismail and his extended family also from Hudaydah found refuge in this simple concrete shell.

ISMAIL ALI ABDALLAH INTERNALLY DISPLACED RESIDENT "We decide to leave because of fear. The strikes were so strong and we were that frightened so we decided to walk. We left at 5 am early morning, just after sunrise. The airplanes were dropping bombs. There were clashes and the children were very scared."

Both families have limited access to food or health care and none of the children go to school.

ALI ABDALLAH'S FAMILY INTERNALLY DISPLACED RESIDENT "We enrolled this older one, but the school was destroyed in the war."

According to the United Nations, more than 3 million people have been internally displaced across Yemen since the war broke out in 2015. Thousands of others, with money, have fled abroad.

Abdallah is from the southern governorate of Abyan and has found refuge in this war-ravaged house.

He was displaced by one of the many terrorist organizations operating in Yemen's power vacuum, but is angry at the Saudi-led coalition for the downward spiral his country is taking.

ABDALLAH AHMAD HAIDARA INTERNALLY DISPLACED RESIDENT "We blame the coalition more than the government because the government and ourselves are under the mercy of the coalition. So the coalition should evaluate the situation and help the government help the citizens."

The United Nations special envoy to Yemen, Martin Griffiths hopes to resume consultations between the Yemeni government and Houthi movement by next month after the second attempt at peace talks in September failed.

NATALIE CARNEY ADEN "The intensified fighting has all but closed the once bustling port and blocked the main roads to Houthis controlled areas, such as the capital Sana'a. The UN has warned that in a worst-case scenario, the battle for Hudaydah could cost up to 250,000 lives, as well as cut off aid supplies to millions of people in desperate need. Natalie Carney CGTN, Aden, Yemen."