A Yemeni boy
kisses the forehead of a killed youngster, following a reported mortar shell
attack on the country's third city of Taez, on February 20, 2021. (Photo: Ahmad
Al-Basha/AFP via Getty Images)
Saudi Arabia
Accused of Sabotaging UN Probe of War Crimes in Yemen
"The council turned its back on victims, bowed to
pressure from the Saudi-led coalition, and put politics before principle."
October
8, 2021
Human rights defenders are expressing outrage after the United Nations Human Rights Council on Thursday voted against continuing a U.N.-backed probe into possible war crimes in Yemen.
Amnesty International said the outcome followed "pressure
by Saudi Arabia and other coalition partners."
"Failure
to renew the U.N.'s Yemen investigation is a stain on the Human Rights
Council's record."
"Let it be clear," said the International Service for
Human Rights following the vote. "States that voted no or abstained on
[the] resolution to ensure continued international monitoring of the human
rights crisis in Yemen support impunity for war crimes and crimes against humanity,
and voted against the rights, dignity, and future of the Yemeni people."
The resolution would have renewed
the mandate of the Group of Eminent Experts (GEE) on Yemen, a group established
by the U.N. council in 2017 which has since documented "unceasing
suffering" by Yemenis and numerous abuses by all parties to the conflict
including the Saudi-led coalition—findings the kingdom has rejected.
The
renewal was narrowly defeated in a 21-18 vote. In the vote called by
Saudi ally Bahrain, 21 countries voted against the Dutch resolution including
China, Cuba, Pakistan, Russia, Venezuela and Uzbekistan. Eighteen including
Britain, France and Germany voted to support it.
There were seven abstentions. According to Reuters, it was the first time a resolution before the body was defeated. Neither the U.S. nor Saudi Arabia is a member of the HRC.
In a statement earlier this year urging
continuation of the GEE's mandate, HRC member Netherlands, joined by Belgium,
Canada, Ireland, and Luxembourg, expressed concern about the ongoing and
"appalling human rights situation, and the ever-deepening humanitarian
crisis in Yemen."
Heba Morayef, Middle East and North
Africa regional director at Amnesty International, said in a statement Thursday
that the outcome represented "an abandonment of the people of Yemen who
are today suffering under one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises."
She accused coalition members
including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates, of having
"brazenly devoted their energy to defeating the sole international
investigative mechanism on Yemen" and said the voting members who failed
to back the extension "should be ashamed for having abandoned the Yemeni
people in their time of need."
"This vote is, in essence, a
green light to all sides to the conflict to carry on with their egregious
violations which have upended the lives of millions of Yemenis over the past
years," Morayef added. "Stopping the GEE will not make the violations
disappear. Nor will it end the urgent humanitarian needs of Yemeni civilians,
the work of brave human rights defenders and organizations in Yemen, nor our
work to support them."
Ahead of the vote, Human Rights
Watch called GEE's work "vital"
as it "remains the only international, impartial, and independent body
reporting on rights violations and abuses in Yemen."
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"The master class
has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.
The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject
class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their
lives." Eugene Victor Debs
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