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Amnesty urges UK to suspend arms sales to Saudi Arabia

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

London, Aug 25, IRNA -- Amnesty International has called on the British government to suspend arms sales to Saudi Arabia following reports that UK-supplied Tornado fighter-bombers have been used in secret attacks in Yemen.

In a new report, the London-based human rights group also expressed concern about “a catalogue of human rights violations” in Yemen, including unlawful killings of those accused of links to al-Qa'ida, to Huthi rebels and Southern Movement activists.

“Our report points to the Saudis using UK-supplied and UK-maintained arms in secret attacks that have left scores of Yemeni civilians dead. The government needs to announce a thorough investigation to get to the bottom of this, reporting the findings back to parliament,” said Amnesty’s UK arms program director Oliver Sprague.

“Meanwhile all current and future UK supplies of arms to Saudi Arabia should be suspended pending the results of this investigation. Lucrative arms sales to Saudi Arabia should not come at the expense of human rights and international law,” Sprague said.

The UK supplied Saudi Arabia with 120 Tornado aircraft under its biggest-ever export deal, code-named al-Yamamah, that started in 1985. A continuing successor contract for 72 Eurofighter Typhoon multirole fighters was signed in August 2006.

Though joint Yemeni-Saudi attacks have been largely unreported, Amnesty said that it had gained information pointing to 'hundreds - possibly thousands - of civilians' being killed in the bombings in which Tornados were “extremely likely” to have been used.

The human rights group’s major concern was that Yemeni authorities are “under pressure from the USA and others to fight al-Qa’ida, and Saudi Arabia to deal with the Huthis” with the result that , national security was being cited “as a pretext to deal with opposition and stifle all criticism.”

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Islamic Republic News Agency/IRNA NewsCode: 213434