UN points to possible ‘war crimes’ in Yemen conflict

All sides in Yemen’s bloody conflict may have committed war crimes, UN investigators say Tuesday, highlighting deadly airstrikes, rampant sexual violence, and the recruitment of young children as soldiers.

In their first report, a team of UN-mandated investigators say they had “reasonable grounds to believe that the parties to the armed conflict in Yemen have committed a substantial number of violations of international humanitarian law.”

Many of these violations may amount to “war crimes,” the report says, pointing to widespread arbitrary detention, rape, torture and the recruitment of children as young as eight to take part in hostilities.

Kamel Jendoubi, who heads the UN’s so-called Group of Independent Eminent International and Regional Experts, say the investigators had identified a number of alleged perpetrators.

“A confidential list of these individuals will be presented today to the (UN) High Commissioner” for Human Rights, he tells journalists in Geneva.

The devastating conflict in Yemen has left nearly 10,000 people dead since March 2015, when a Saudi-led coalition intervened to fight Houthi rebels closing in on the last bastion of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi’s government.

— AFP