A Shameful Relationship:

British Complicity in Saudi War Crimes in Yemen

Rasa - In Yemen, Saudi Arabia and its wicked coalition of regime changers - backed by the United States and Britain - fear the good, because the good are a constant reproach to their “consciences”.

News ID: 423329

Date: 08 September 2016 - 18:18

RNA - Here, the international civil society never wonders to see them wicked, but they often wonder to see them not ashamed. The criminal hordes have done wicked things they are proud of. It means they have no “conscience.” It also means they have no remorse at all:

At a time when the UN’s High Commission for Human Rights says “the Saudi forces are responsible for a disproportionate amount of attacks on civilians,” and while members of UK’s parliament are debating whether to impose an arms ban on Saudi Arabia in light of the reports that its dirty war has indiscriminately targeted civilians and civilian objects, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is arguing that there has been no "serious breach" of International Law and International Humanitarian Law!

In a letter submitted to the parliament on Monday, he wrote, “The key test for our continued arms exports to Saudi Arabia in relation to International Humanitarian Law is whether those weapons might be used in a commission of a serious breach of International Humanitarian Law. Having regard to all the information available to us (by the Saudis), we assess this test has not been met."

Rather than condemning this dirty war, the United States also stands fully behind its Saudi vassals. Secretary of State John Kerry makes this shameful relationship abundantly clear: “We have made it clear that we stand with our friends in Saudi Arabia.” Mind you, the supply of military advisers underlines that this is no passive acquiescence in what the Saudis are doing either: The British and American governments are directly involved - through long-standing, pre-existing arrangements.

Worse yet, the harm-doers in London and Washington insist that killing, maiming and inflicting mass suffering in Yemen is truly comely. That with such crimes, the more blood, the more horror there is, the more imposing they are, the more picturesque, so to speak; that these crimes are not shameful and disgraceful - all horror aside. They are even legal and justified, they say, as all the arms the Saudis have received thus far (to the tune of $110 billion), the British and American governments are running them through legal and international channels.

Like it or not, these reckless arms sales are the main driving force behind massive humanitarian and refugee crises, not just in Yemen, but also in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Libya. Documented instances by various international rights groups and aid organisations, including the UN Human Rights Council, Amnesty International, Doctors Without Borders, and Human Rights Watch confirm all this and more.

They say where the Saudi-led coalition has targeted civilians, munitions have continued to flow from both Britain and the United States. Since the dirty war began last year, the Brits alone supplied $2.8 billion in weapons and provided training for Saudi forces – just like their American cousins. Little wonder last month, the international watchdog Control Arms Coalition blasted western governments, particularly those that have ratified the Arms Trade Treaty, for their complicity in this running carnage.

All told, don't expect emotive calls for an arms embargo against Saudi Arabia any time soon, much less international scrutiny or British and American governments being held to account to what they are doing in the name of War on Terror and “humanitarian” intervention in Yemen. That will never happen. You will never see a policy and strategy of preventing wars in London and Washington either.

The “saviours of humanity” don't have a policy that is based on human rights around the world; a policy that says stop arming and aiding repugnant regimes like Saudi Arabia which is bombing and killing civilians in serious violation of International Humanitarian Law. This is an incontestable fact. The world needs to know that Yemen is a human-made disaster, a condemnable dirty war, and that the fingerprints of the United States and Britain are all over it.

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