PARIS (Dispatches) – Civil society organizations have filed a lawsuit at the Administrative Court of Paris against the French government’s arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
A joint statement by Amnesty International, the European Centre for Constitution and Human Rights (ECCHR), and the Disclose Foundation said that the suit was filed to reveal documents related to the French arms sales.
“French weapons are being used in humanitarian violations against civilians in Yemen,” said the groups. “If [the French government] refuses to disclose the documents related to arms sales, it will be violating the public’s right to obtain information about controversial topics.” They stressed that such a right is guaranteed by French law.
The human rights organizations pointed out that around 70 French fighter jets have been used in the Yemen war. Tanks were exported to the UAE in the 1990s.
Yemen has been suffering from violence and chaos since 2015, when Saudi Arabia and its allies—emboldened by their Western-manufactured arms—launched a devastating war against the poorest Middle Eastern country to reinstall Yemen’s overthrown government of Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi in Sana’a and crush the Ansarullah resistance movement.
The war, accompanied by a tight siege, has failed to reach its goals and killed hundreds of thousands of Yemeni people, putting millions more at risk of starvation by destroying much of the country’s infrastructure.
The Sana’a government has warned Saudi Arabia to stop the war and siege of the country, or to expect larger and more extensive retaliatory operations.
Yemen maintains that its operations against Saudi Arabia are defensive in nature and would end as soon as Riyadh ends the war and siege against the country.
The UN Humanitarian Affairs chief says women and girls are more likely to be hungry, sick or exposed to gender-based violence as a result of the Saudi-created crisis in Yemen, warning that millions of Yemenis are “a step away from starvation”.
During a meeting, dubbed Yemen: Responding to the crises within the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, Humanitarian Affairs chief Martin Griffiths told world leaders that the most vulnerable always “bear the highest cost” of the crisis.
“For too many of Yemen’s children, war is a fact of life – one that has robbed them of safety, education and opportunities,” he said. “Women and girls are more likely to be hungry, sick or exposed to gender-based violence.”