Oxfam: Dozens of Civilians Killed by US, UK Weapons in Yemen

The weapons provided by the United Kingdom and the United States to the Saudi-led coalition have killed at least 87 civilians and injured 136 others in Yemen for more than a year, according to the Oxfam’s report.

The report said the coalition led by America and Saudi Arabia used the US and UK weapons in hundreds of attacks that killed civilians in Yemen between January 2021 and the end of February 2022.

Oxfam’s report came ahead of a legal challenge by the Campaign Against the Arms Trade, a group of anti-arms activists, against the UK government for selling weapons used in the Yemen war, in which Britain is the second largest supplier of arms to Saudi Arabia after the United States.

According to Martin Butcher, Oxfam’s policy advisor on arms and conflict and author of the report, the research was based on an analysis of 1,727 attacks on civilians in the Yemen war over a 14-month period.

He said that Saudi Arabia, supplied by British and American weapons, was responsible for a quarter of these attacks, adding: “It is relentless, as people find it very difficult to escape violence and killing.”

In response to a query from The Associated Press, a spokesman for Britain’s Department for International Trade said “it operates one of the world’s most robust and transparent export control systems”.

“We screen all our export applications thoroughly against a rigorous risk assessment framework and keep all licenses under close and ongoing review as standard,” the spokesman added.

The 43-page report stated that the attacks analyzed saw the killing of at least 839 civilians killed and the injury of 1,775 others, in addition to at least 87 civilians were killed and 136 others wounded in air strikes.

“The air and artillery strikes included cluster bombs, which are “weapons prohibited by international conventions and customary law,” according to Oxfam.

The report indicated that it found at least 19 attacks by the coalition on health facilities and ambulances, saying that 293 airstrikes forced people to flee their homes.