UK role in Yemen conflict

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Eurofighter Typhoons have flown 'combat missions' over Yemen

Overview and links to external research

UK govt confirms it is storing and releasing for loading the weapons used by Saudi aircraft to bomb Yemen. Yemen is a British war and ministers are complicit in war crimes. The idea that UK is not part of the coalition is a fabricated lie that media is playing along with.
Graham Jones, a Labour MP and chair of the Commons committees on arms export controls (CAEC), also said that blame for the war in Yemen lay primarily with Iran, and not the west or Saudi Arabia.
A British former technician, stationed in Saudi Arabia until recently, told Channel 4 that if this support was withdrawn then “in seven to 14 days there wouldn’t be a jet in the sky” over Yemen. A former Saudi Air Force officer stated flatly that his compatriots “can’t keep the Typhoon in the air without the British”, and that, although US-supplied jets also play an indispensable role, the British Typhoon is so crucial that “without the Typhoon they will stop the war”.

Suppression of journalists

See also Yemen#Disclose.ngo_and_the_DGSI_Yemen_papers_leak

Special Forces

See also Catgory:UK#Military

The Coalition Special Forces team has the capability to launch drones from the secret Camp Lemonnier base in Djibouti.
The SAS is working alongside members of Operational Detachment Alpha, the primary fighting force for the Green Berets. Under US command, the heavily armed Special Forces team flew into Aden from Djibouti aboard a UAE Chinook helicopter and met UAE commanders before heading north-east in unmarked pick-up trucks.
The claims are politically difficult since ministers are eager to suggest that as the penholder on the Yemen issue at the United Nations, Britain is an honest broker in the civil war, which is now entering its fifth year since the Saudi air campaign started. The UK is known to be close to the Saudi military but denies it is involved in operations against the Houthis in Yemen.

In February 2021. The Salvation government arrested and began trials against alleged informants recruited by UK and US agents, working to gather on the ground intelligence. See talk See also Talk:reports nine british soldiers killed Feb 23, 2019

Relationship with Saudi Arabia, BAE systems, arms industry

See also Supply of weapons and European arms industry

Mr Ethical on Twitter - Theresa May's husband's company is the largest shareholder in BAE Systems, largest arms supplier to Saudi Arabia. Osborne's Blackrock is 5th.
BAE concerned that the continuing Saudi war, although justifiable, might be bad PR for their Saudi business partners,
  • February 2019: The UK defends its strategic partnership with Saudi Arabia and seeks with the US the removal of Saudi Arabia from a proposed EU money laundering blacklist. Brussels’ decision to include Riyadh has caused a spat between the commission and the EU’s biggest member states that are opposed to Europe taking a tougher stance against anti-money laundering than other global authorities. The Saudi government and its allies including the US have also lobbied Brussels to remove Riyadh from the list, said officials. 
  • Uprising Today: - This could increase tensions between the kingdom and the EU, which has already called on its member states to halt arms sales to Riyadh over the murder of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October.
  • UK's Saudi weapons sales unlawful, Lords committee finds - The Guardian, February 16, 2019
    • The Government asserts that, in its licensing of arms sales to Saudi Arabia, it is narrowly on the right side of international humanitarian law.’ But, the Committee members note, in their opinion, ‘Although conclusive evidence is not yet available, we assess that it [the Government] is narrowly on the wrong side: given the volume and type of arms being exported to the Saudi-led coalition, we believe they are highly likely to be the cause of significant civilian casualties in Yemen, risking the contravention of international humanitarian law.’The situation was discussed at the House of Lords.
  • CAAT June 20, 2019 - BREAKING: The Court of Appeal has ruled that UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia for use in #Yemen are UNLAWFUL. All arms sales licences suspended!

Saudi Operations Room

UK and US and officers are present in the war room for "training, supervision and evaluation", with national flags behind their desks
* Response to Parliamentary question January 31, 2022 - We have a very small number of liaison officers based in the Saudi Air Operations Centre. They come under UK command and control and observe Saudi-led coalition air operations in Yemen to help the UK support Saudi compliance with International Humanitarian Law. Govt answer to Parliamentary question]