When conflict intensified in Yemen in 2015, Mulhem (40), his pregnant wife and three children fled their home and went into hiding in Aden city. For three months they sheltered in a safe house, with multiple families tightly squashed into a single room.
But the conflict worsened and airstrikes struck the city on a daily basis. Mulhem fled with his wife and children. What they saw along the road out of Aden shocked them to the core.
“We saw many bodies of people who had been killed. Some of them were even eaten by dogs,” recalls Mulhem.
“At the checkpoints we had to pass, they destroyed all the human dignity we had left by beating us. They even used us as human shields when the airstrikes started.”
Mulhem’s family arrived in Yemen’s largest city Sana’a. He had to hide his identification papers, as he feared being kidnapped if he was found. After a stressful month of hiding from the people who were after him, the family escaped by plane to Saudi Arabia. From there they travelled to Jordan where Mulhem was hired by the Norwegian Refugee Council’s expert deployment roster, NORCAP.
For the last 18 months Mulhem has been working for NORCAP, moving from one country to another responding to humanitarian crises. Today he works in Greece, helping refugees who have crossed the Mediterranean. Unfortunately for Mulhem and his family, it is still not safe to return to Yemen.
When asked why he became an aid worker, Mulhem recalls his childhood: “As a child I was recruited to fight. I was a victim of violence, torture and war. As an adult I was forced to flee with my family and I was at risk of being kidnapped. I wanted to become an aid worker to prevent horrible things like this happening to other people. No one should be forced to flee.”
