The political crisis that has pushed Yemen to the brink of civil war has cost the economy as much as $5 billion, and immediate aid is needed to prevent a meltdown, the country's trade minister said on Saturday.

'We have reports that the losses range between four to five billion dollars,' Hisham Sharaf Abdalla, minister of industry and trade, told Reuters in an interview.

The political crisis is expected to swell the deficit from an initial projection of 4 per cent of GDP to 7 per cent, he said. – Reuters