RugbyRebels

Just how complicit is Britain in Saudi's war crimes - ie terrorism?

Britain bears a very heavy responsibility for the murder, mayhem and carnage being wrought by Saudi Arabia in Yemen
The escalating war in Yemen has subverted the international order. Since the end of World War Two, there has been a pattern of client regimes engaging in proxy wars on behalf of major powers. Today it is the other way around.

In Yemen, Britain and the United States are dancing to the Saudi tune.

Crucially, Saudi Arabia and its allies did not attack Yemen on behalf of the West. It is Britain and the US who are facilitating Saudi Arabia’s war.

We provide Saudi Arabia with arms and military advice, give moral support and, through the UN Security Council, essential diplomatic protection.

Britain has, in short, become Saudi Arabia’s proxy on the international stage as it pummels Yemen from the air in an attempt to restore Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi - the internationally recognised Yemeni president who fled to Riyadh, begging for protection, after he was chased out of his country by rebels from the north Yemen Houthi movement.

This is the very troubling diplomatic background to the funeral bombing in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa on Saturday. Even though four days have passed, details are still emerging. Nobody is yet certain how many died.

Official figures state 140 were killed, along with countless injured, many of whom need urgent medical treatment which is unavailable in Sanaa hospitals. However, thanks to the Saudi air blockade, they cannot get out of the country to obtain the life-saving treatment they need.

Wretched response

Britain bears a very heavy responsibility for this murder, mayhem and carnage. Yet the response from Middle East Minister Tobias Ellwood has been wretched.

He says that he had "raised concerns" with Saudi Arabia. I have studied the minister’s morally abject statement. The unfortunate Ellwood cannot even bring himself to condemn the attack, and has not demanded an independent investigation.

This is part of a pattern of behaviour from Ellwood. I am coming to believe that his persistent failure to condemn the savage acts committed by Saudi Arabia and its allies in the Yemeni conflict makes him an accessory to mass murder.

Consider the facts: in the face of repeated Saudi atrocities, Britain continues to supply arms to Saudi Arabia and we have effectively blocked the establishment of an international independent investigative mechanism to look into the conflict.

A calamity is unfolding in Yemen and it's time the world woke up

Meanwhile, Britain has advisers in control rooms assisting Saudi-led coalition bombing raids across Yemen. What on earth are they doing there?

A Ministry of Defence spokesman told The Telegraph in January that these advisers are in Saudi Arabia to ensure “best practice” and make sure that international humanitarian law is observed.

If that is the case, Britain's military advisers in Saudi Arabia are a bunch of incompetents who are failing scandalously in their task. Either they are indeed exceptionally incompetent, or the government is not being straight about their true role.

There are urgent, burning questions to be answered about the true role of British advisers in Saudi Arabia as the massacre of civilians continues.

Parliament misled

We also know that Ellwood (and other ministers) have repeatedly misled the House of Commons about their knowledge of Saudi atrocities, something they were obliged to confess in statements in July.

Meanwhile, he makes excuses for Saudi conduct. This is what he told MPs on the floor of the Commons in January: “We are aware that the Houthis, who are very media-savvy in such a situation, are using their own artillery pieces deliberately, targeting individual areas where the people are not loyal to them, to give the impression that there have been air attacks.”

On Tuesday, I asked the Foreign Office for evidence to support Ellwood’s eye-catching claim that the Houthis were massacring their own people in order to fool the world into thinking that the Saudis were attacking Yemeni civilians.

http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/pe ... 1337851745

What the Trump charade is designed to distract you from:

What if the United States went to war and nobody here even noticed? The question is absurd, isn’t it? And yet, this almost perfectly describes what actually happened this past week.

While many Americans, myself included, were all hypnotized by the bizarre spectacle of the Republican nominee for president, a US navy destroyer fired a barrage of cruise missiles at three radar sites controlled by the rebel Houthi movement in Yemen. This attack marked the first time the US has fought the rebels directly in Yemen’s devastating civil war.

The Trump show has managed to bump all serious and necessary policy debates not just off the table but out of the room
The cruise missile salvo ramps up the already significant US military involvement in deeply divided and desperately poor Yemen. While it’s true that the US has launched drone strikes on al-Qaida targets in Yemen for years, sometimes killing civilians and even US citizens, this particular military engagement has the potential to drag the US straight into a protracted and escalating conflict. And, as everyone knows, America has an uncanny ability to enter protracted and escalating military conflicts.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ?CMP=fb_gu

And, as everyone knows, Americans have an uncanny ability to fire any ordinance at any given moment just to watch things go boom and in the belief that becoming immune to the emotions of killing people and innocent creatures is some macho rite de passage.
Whereas we actually know it's the descent to insanity and self loathing.

Yesterday 129 Labour MPs voted to stop support for Saudi Arabia’s campaign in Yemen. The vote was defeated by a majority of 90.

The motion called for support to be withdrawn from the Saudi government until a United Nations investigation could determine whether the Saudi bombing campaign had breached international law. The motion did not explicitly include a suspension of UK arms sales.

Over 100 Labour MPs did not vote on the motion. If all of them had voted to support it, the government would have been defeated.

See full list here: http://evolvepolitics.com/heres-a-list- ... -in-yemen/

Also: Pretty much every organization that comments on this kind of thing – the UN, the EU, Amnesty International, Oxfam, Human Rights Watch, and more – have said that the use of these weapons against civilians is breaking international humanitarian law. The Guardian recently reported that a third of the bombs dropped by Saudi Arabia have hit civilian targets. And it seems like things are only getting worse. Last week a bomb hit a funeral site in the capital city of Yemen, killing 140 and injuring over 500 people. So it seems that British weapons are being used in attacks that are breaking international law.

http://stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-co ... sh-economy

It gets worse. The Saudis have been using banned British cluster bombs, it appears http://www.itv.com/news/2016-10-26/itv- ... n-attacks/

Sauds massacred 60 today, including prison inmates.

Arab coalition warplanes have bombed a security complex near the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah, killing 60 people including inmates of a prison on the site, a regional official and medical sources has said.

The Saudi-led coalition has been fighting Yemen's armed Houthi movement since March 2015 to try to restore the internationally recognised President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who was driven into exile by the Iran-allied group in late 2014.

A spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The air attack was one of the deadliest among thousands of bombings, which have largely failed to dislodge the Houthis from the capital Sanaa but have repeatedly hit schools, markets, hospitals and homes, killing many civilians.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-10-31/y ... 60/7978884

Surely the most under-reported international news story of the past week, especially in America, it seems: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/saudi ... -r7gmf5ljb

Hair hair

he latest ceasefire in Yemen is unlikely to prevent Saudi Arabia from resuming its brutal assault on its impoverished neighbor. The Yemeni people are paying the price for Riyadh’s determination to reinstate an unpopular government friendly to the royal family. This commitment to rule or ruin apparently comes from Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known more for his ambition than judgment. Incoming President Donald Trump should end American involvement in Riyadh’s aggression.

More hair: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/doug-band ... 11720.html

Out of curiosity do you write for the Russian Times?

Not a thing about this in the American news today (so far as I can see): https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/ ... -civilians

An air raid by the Saudi-led anti-Houthi coalition has killed 12 civilians in the north-west of the country, rebel media and witnesses said on Wednesday.

Six others were wounded in the raid that targeted a vehicle in Hiran, in Hajja province, reported the Houthi-run sabanews.net.

Witnesses said the victims were on their way to a market.

The defence secretary was forced to tell the Commons that British-made cluster bombs had been dropped by Saudi Arabia in Yemen, prompting MPs and charities to say that the UK should stop supporting the Gulf state’s military action. Sir Michael Fallon said that a “limited number” of the controversial BL755 bombs had been used by Saudi Arabia, shortly after the Gulf state formally admitted it had deployed the weapons in the Yemeni conflict.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/ ... ls-commons

Not trying to defend it but.........the munitions did not detonate as the codes to do so were deleted during system upgrades on the planes that carry them. The U.K. had requested for the bombs not to be used, which the Saudis agreed to, and for them to be destroyed, which the Saudis did not agree to.

Well, the same news was reported months ago (just scroll up on this thread to see), so it's not as if the British didn't know the Saudis were intending all along to drop these munitions on weddings, schools, hospitals and funerals . . .

Yeah, I know. Not much the British can do about bombs sold in the 1980's other than what they have done. Luckily nobody else is dropping bombs in the wrong place.

Mellsblue wrote:Yeah, I know. Not much the British can do about bombs sold in the 1980's other than what they have done. Luckily nobody else is dropping bombs in the wrong place.

But the UK has supplied billions of dollars worth of arms to Saudi Arabia since the bombing of Yemen began.

Figures shared with the Observer show that in 2014 the UK licensed just £170m of arms to 18 of the 27 countries then on the “priority countries” list. The massive increase in sales was largely attributable to sales of weapons to Saudi Arabia. The largest export licence granted was for £1.7bn of fighter jets, agreed in May 2015. In July 2015 the UK approved the export of £990m of air-to-air missiles. In September, it approved the sale of £62m of bombs to the country. All three sales took place after the bombing of Yemen began in March 2015, prompting concerns that civilian buildings have been targeted in widespread human rights violations.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/ ... udi-arabia

We were discussing cluster bombs that were sold in the 80's not current arms deals.

We're just as complicit in what's happening in Aleppo by just sitting back and letting it happen. No complaints from you about that, though.

Mellsblue wrote:We were discussing cluster bombs that were sold in the 80's not current arms deals.

We're just as complicit in what's happening in Aleppo by just sitting back and letting it happen. No complaints from you about that, though.

First point, yes I realise we were discussing cluster bombs. I was the one who brought it up, remember? I just made a comment about the ongoing arms sales.

If you haven't seen any posts from me complaining about what America has done to Syria - including Aleppo - then you haven't been paying attention.

rowan wrote:

Mellsblue wrote:We were discussing cluster bombs that were sold in the 80's not current arms deals.

We're just as complicit in what's happening in Aleppo by just sitting back and letting it happen. No complaints from you about that, though.

First point, yes I realise we were discussing cluster bombs. I was the one who brought it up, remember? I just made a comment about the ongoing arms sales.

If you haven't seen any posts from me complaining about what America has done to Syria - including Aleppo - then you haven't been paying attention.

So you agree you changed the topic.

The US are doing nothing in Aleppo at present. Unlike another nation.

I don't tend to pay attention, no. I'm starting to remember why.

No, I continued the discussion, but pretty much on the same topic. The fact that Saudi has used UK-made cluster bombs on civilians in Yemen should be reason enough to discontinue arms sales to the kingdom, and that is exactly what is being debated.

Meanwhile, having accused me of changing the subject, you decided to bring Aleppo up out of the blue

Yes, the US is doing nothing at present, having instigated this conflict and filled Syria up with terrorists. Now Aleppo has finally been liberated by Syrian and Russian forces, the terrorists have been defeated. Presently US-backed Iraqi forces are trying to achieve the same outcome in terrorist-occupied Mosul.

rowan wrote:No, I continued the discussion, but pretty much on the same topic. The fact that Saudi has used UK-made cluster bombs on civilians in Yemen should be reason enough to discontinue arms sales to the kingdom, and that is exactly what is being debated.

Meanwhile, having accused me of changing the subject, you decided to bring Aleppo up out of the blue

Yes, the US is doing nothing at present, having instigated this conflict and filled Syria up with terrorists. Now Aleppo has finally been liberated by Syrian and Russian forces, the terrorists have been defeated. Presently US-backed Iraqi forces are trying to achieve the same outcome in terrorist-occupied Mosul.

I was talking solely about the cluster bombs, you then moved onto present arms deals. I'm happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms.

My point about Aleppo was that you are happy to criticise others whilst turning a blind eye to atrocities elsewhere when it suits.

Mellsblue wrote:

rowan wrote:No, I continued the discussion, but pretty much on the same topic. The fact that Saudi has used UK-made cluster bombs on civilians in Yemen should be reason enough to discontinue arms sales to the kingdom, and that is exactly what is being debated.

Meanwhile, having accused me of changing the subject, you decided to bring Aleppo up out of the blue

Yes, the US is doing nothing at present, having instigated this conflict and filled Syria up with terrorists. Now Aleppo has finally been liberated by Syrian and Russian forces, the terrorists have been defeated. Presently US-backed Iraqi forces are trying to achieve the same outcome in terrorist-occupied Mosul.

I was talking solely about the cluster bombs, you then moved onto present arms deals. I'm happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms.

My point about Aleppo was that you are happy to criticise others whilst turning a blind eye to atrocities elsewhere when it suits.

No, I haven't turned a blind eye to what America has done to Syria. On the contrary, I've probably expressed more outrage than anybody else on this forum. I've started at least one thread about it.

& if you are happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms to Saudi what on earth are we arguing about

rowan wrote:

Mellsblue wrote:

rowan wrote:No, I continued the discussion, but pretty much on the same topic. The fact that Saudi has used UK-made cluster bombs on civilians in Yemen should be reason enough to discontinue arms sales to the kingdom, and that is exactly what is being debated.

Meanwhile, having accused me of changing the subject, you decided to bring Aleppo up out of the blue

Yes, the US is doing nothing at present, having instigated this conflict and filled Syria up with terrorists. Now Aleppo has finally been liberated by Syrian and Russian forces, the terrorists have been defeated. Presently US-backed Iraqi forces are trying to achieve the same outcome in terrorist-occupied Mosul.

I was talking solely about the cluster bombs, you then moved onto present arms deals. I'm happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms.

My point about Aleppo was that you are happy to criticise others whilst turning a blind eye to atrocities elsewhere when it suits.

No, I haven't turned a blind eye to what America has done to Syria. On the contrary, I've probably expressed more outrage than anybody else on this forum. I've started at least one thread about it.

& if you are happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms to Saudi what on earth are we arguing about

The fact that you're so blinkered you've no idea I'm obviously talking about Russian actions.

Mellsblue wrote:

rowan wrote:

Mellsblue wrote: I was talking solely about the cluster bombs, you then moved onto present arms deals. I'm happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms.

My point about Aleppo was that you are happy to criticise others whilst turning a blind eye to atrocities elsewhere when it suits.

No, I haven't turned a blind eye to what America has done to Syria. On the contrary, I've probably expressed more outrage than anybody else on this forum. I've started at least one thread about it.

& if you are happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms to Saudi what on earth are we arguing about

The fact that you're so blinkered you've no idea I'm obviously talking about Russian actions.

So you're on the side of the terrorists then?

rowan wrote:

Mellsblue wrote:

rowan wrote:
No, I haven't turned a blind eye to what America has done to Syria. On the contrary, I've probably expressed more outrage than anybody else on this forum. I've started at least one thread about it.

& if you are happy to condemn the British for still supplying arms to Saudi what on earth are we arguing about

The fact that you're so blinkered you've no idea I'm obviously talking about Russian actions.

So you're on the side of the terrorists then?

No, the innocent civilians.

Mellsblue wrote:

rowan wrote:

Mellsblue wrote: The fact that you're so blinkered you've no idea I'm obviously talking about Russian actions.

So you're on the side of the terrorists then?

No, the innocent civilians.

Right, so the US-backed terrorists are holding them hostage in the city they have occupied, are committing all kinds of atrocities against them, and the Syrian and Russian forces liberate the city. You don't liberate an occupied city by waltzing in and throwing daisies in the air, unfortunately. The Iraqi forces are now doing precisely the same thing in Mosul, but not a peep out of you (or the Western media) about the collateral damage caused by the terrorists' tactic of taking the civilian population hostage.