'US violating own laws by cluster bomb sales to Saudi'

A leading international rights group says the US sales of globally prohibited cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia violate America’s own laws.

Human Rights Watch released a report Sunday providing new indications that Saudi Arabia has fired American-made cluster munitions, banned by international treaty, in civilian areas of Yemen, and said their use may also violate United States law.

The report included photos showing unexploded but potentially lethal remnants of American cluster weapons.

If confirmed, the report could put new pressure on the United States over support for its ally Saudi Arabia in the Yemen war, according to the New York Times.

“Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners, as well as their US supplier, are blatantly disregarding the global standard that says cluster munitions should never be used under any circumstances,” Steve Goose, the arms director at Human Rights Watch, said in the report.

Human Rights Watch and other groups have previously accused Saudi Arabia of using cluster munitions in Yemen, including in a January 6 strike in Sana’a, the capital, and have criticized the United States as an accomplice.

In a January 12 letter to President Barack Obama, Megan Burke, the director of the Cluster Munition Coalition, a disarmament group, urged him to “demand that Saudi-led coalition members stop using cluster munitions,” and said the United States “should investigate its own role in the recent strikes.”

John Kirby, the State Department spokesman, said in a statement Sunday night, “We have seen the Human Rights Watch report, and are reviewing it. Obviously we remain deeply concerned by reports of harm to civilians and have encouraged the Saudi-led coalition to investigate reports of civilian harm.”

Saudi officials did not comment, but have denied ordering the use of cluster munitions in Yemen.

Under a 2009 law, only cluster munitions with a failure rate of one percent or less can be exported by the US, and they can be used only against “clearly defined military targets,” not “where civilians are known to be present.”

Saudi Arabia says its military campaign against Yemen, which started on March 26, 2015, is meant to undermine the Ansarullah movement and restore power to the fugitive former Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh.

Over 8,270 people, among them 2,236 children, have been killed and 16,015 others injured since the onset of the Saudi raids last March.

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