In 2011, the Arab spring protests spread to Yemen further undermining the already precarious political balance affected by the open conflict between the central government and Houthi rebels in the Saada region to the north of the country. The resulting instability and undermining of the central government prolonged and intensified the civil war, which rapidly spread across the entire eastern half of the country, involving various regional powers, in particular Saudi Arabia, Iran and the UAE. Today, Yemen is a profoundly divided country. The Houthi rebels control a third of the country to the north-east, including the strategic port of Hodeida. The legitimate government has a precarious hold on the territories to the south, where the influence of the separatist movement is greater than it even has been since the 1994 civil war, and to the west where the Islamist movements are particularly active.

The humanitarian crisis caused by the conflict remains one of the largest and most severe in the world, and continues to deteriorate due to the ongoing fighting and the disastrous economic situation. The total breakdown in the provision of essential services has added new contributing factors to the existing humanitarian crisis, as demonstrated by the outbreak of a cholera epidemic in 2016 which affected more than one million Yemenis and caused 3,000 deaths, as well as the onset of diseases previously not present in the country, such as dengue fever, due to the extremely poor sanitary conditions. The current Covid-19 pandemic is another major risk which may cause a further deterioration in the crisis, both from a public health perspective and in terms of its impact on the already problematic socio-economic conditions which mean Yemen is today exposed to a risk of famine, according to the United Nations.