Dubai: The United Nations, the government of Yemen and Al Houthi rebels should investigate violations of laws of war during the recent conflict in the north of the country, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said.
The truce between the Yemeni government and Al Houthi rebels presents an opportunity to investigate violations of laws of war by both sides in order to sustain the fragile truce and ensure that it does not break down, said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at HRW.
Violations cited by the report included indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas and the use of child soldiers by the government, and the use of human shields, use of child soldiers and looting by the rebels.
Referring to the “impunity” surrounding the suffering of civilians in Yemen, Stork strongly criticized the Friends of Yemen grouping, singling out the United States and United Kingdom for turning a blind eye to the alleged violations.
“Both Jeffrey Feltman (US assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs) and (British foreign secretary) David Miliband have made remarks about the conflict in Yemen as being an internal matter. As in ‘we are not going to say anything critical’. This concerns us very much,” he said.
He also said there was no indication from Gulf Cooperation Council states of support for an investigation of the alleged violations.
The group released a 54 page report on findings of its two researchers there. One of the reasearchers, Christoph Wilke, said that while some of the allegations made were not independently verifiable due to difficulties of access to the affected areas, enough evidence was compiled to call for a UN investigation.
The report was released in Dubai because HRW officials were not granted visas to Yemen, said Stork.
