The UK government has refused calls to end arms sales to Saudi Arabia and bring its policy towards the Gulf Kingdom in line with its major ally, the US, Middle East Monitor reported.
UK refuses to stop arms sales to Saudi Arabia, in line with US policy
STEPANAKERT, FEBRUARY 10, ARTSAKHPRESS:In one of his many policy reversals from the Trump era, the new administration of President Joe Biden suspended arms sales to Riyadh and the United Arab Emirates due to concerns over human rights abuse and alleged war crimes in Yemen.
Speaking in the Commons, Tobias Ellwood, the Conservative chair of the defense committee, urged the UK "to align itself fully with its closest security ally and end similar arms exports connected to the war … The US reset is very much to be welcomed and poses our first big test as to what global Britain means in practice." Ellwood said that the US suspension of arms sales was necessary to create the conditions for peace talks.
Rejecting calls to end arms sales to Riyadh UK Foreign Office minister, James Cleverly said: "The decisions the US takes on matters of arms sales are decisions for the US. The UK takes its own arms export responsibilities very seriously, and we continue to assess all arms export licenses in accordance with strict licensing criteria." Cleverly argued that British arms sales licenses were issued with great care to ensure they did not lead to any breach of humanitarian law.
Between 2010 and 2019, 40 per cent of UK arms exports went to Saudi Arabia. According to the UK-based rights group Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) £11 billion ($15.5 billion) worth of arms has been sold by the UK to Riyadh since 2008. The largest increase in arms export was in 2015 at the start of the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen.
The devastating humanitarian consequences of the war prompted questions about Britain's role in what the UN has described as the worst humanitarian crisis since the Second World War. Insisting that arms sales to the Gulf states were illegal in light of evidence that the UK made weapons were being used to carry out alleged war crimes, campaign groups challenged the Tory government in court. In 2019, a court ruled that UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia were indeed unlawful, prompting the government to tighten its export license to the Gulf states.
