Saudi Arabia wants UN inquiry blocked: Analyst

Press TV has conducted an interview with William Beeman, a professor at the University of Minnesota, in Minneapolis, to discuss Riyadh’s ongoing aggression against Yemen.

What follows is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Again, daily attacks happening in Yemen by the Saudi air force, little condemnation. How long this is going to have to take? We have more than 6,000 people dead now, mostly civilians, and the international community, the UN is just starting to verbally denounce this situation but still no concrete efforts being done to stop the Saudi onslaught. What do you think? What has to happen in order for that to happen?

Beeman: Well, as you mentioned, the United Nations is really just starting. There was a resolution introduced by the Netherlands just yesterday for international inquiry into human rights violations in Yemen. They did not specifically name Saudi Arabia but Saudi Arabia knows that if an inquiry takes place, an international inquiry, that they are going to be charged with human rights violations because of the large number of civilian deaths that are taking place and civilian injuries. There have been, as you mentioned, more than 6,000 deaths in the entire period but even since March of this year, there have been more than 1,500 deaths and more than 3,500 injuries.

The United States is silently backing Saudi attempts to block this United Nations inquiry. The United States has had a very difficult relationship with Saudi Arabia ever since the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action about Iran’s nuclear program. The Saudis reluctantly agreed to the JCPOA, nevertheless their relations with the United States have been very strained. So, the United States has been very careful about criticizing Saudi Arabia for other matters and they have been unfortunately increasing military aid to Saudi Arabia and we suspect that some of that military aid and equipment is going to support the attacks on Yemen.

Press TV: And now what? With the situation, we see… as you said, the United Nations is starting to… there is rumblings at least verbally of perhaps condemning Saudi Arabia and you said if the inquiry takes place, they know that they will be condemned. But is that true? I mean if we look at the past history of various entities, for example the Israelis and what they did, their onslaught on Gaza and basically nothing happened that time around either. Do you think with the Saudis, it is any different?

Beeman: Well, the real question is if there were a bill in the United Nations, in the Security Council to condemn or to try to contain the Saudi efforts to attack Yemen, whether the United States or other nations would veto that resolution.

That is what has happened with regard to Israel. The resolutions have come forward but the United States with veto power has always supported Israel and has always vetoed these resolutions.

However, the Saudis do not even want the inquiry to be made in the United Nations, whether it comes to a resolution or not. They simply do not want the publicity for the actions that they are taking in Yemen and it is really quite a disaster because not only the Houthis, the Zaidis who by the way ruled Yemen since the 9th century down to the 1970s… sometimes people seem to think that this is a more recent uprising but the civil war in Yemen has gone on since the 1970s. But they are not only damaging the Houthis but also the normal civilian population who are not part of the Zaidi group and this is really intolerable.

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