Hammond Calls for investigation into Saudi Arabia’s actions in Yemen

Althawra Net

There must be “proper investigations” to ensure that Saudi Arabia has not breached international humanitarian law in the war in Yemen, according to Britain’s foreign secretary, who said that shipments of UK-supplied weapons would be halted if the Saudis fell foul of those probes.

Philip Hammond’s comments came as Britain is being urged to halt the supply of weapons to Riyadh in the light of evidence that civilians are being killed in Saudi-led attacks on rebel forces in Yemen.

Speaking during a visit to the US, Hammond told BBC’s Newsnight on Tuesday that he had discussed the use of the weapons in Yemen when he visited Saudi Arabia recently.

“The Saudis deny that there have been any breaches of international humanitarian law,” he said. “Obviously that denial alone is not enough. We need to see proper investigations. We need to work with the Saudis to establish that international humanitarian law has been complied with. We have an export licensing system that responds if we find that it is not. We will then find that we cannot licence additional shipments of weapons.”

Saying that he was aware that some British weapons were being used in Yemen, Hammond added: “That doesn’t fall foul of the export licensing criteria. It would be hypocritical to think that we could have a large defence industry exporting weapons systems and that they never get used. What matters is that they are used legally in compliance with international humanitarian law and we monitor that very carefully.

“The important thing is that they are being used legally in an international armed conflict. There have been accusations of breaches of international humanitarian law. We regularly intervene with the Saudis to encourage them to be transparent with us.”

The Guardian