Stasa Salacanin – Fonte: © Alaraby
08 febbraio 2018

In the past month, three European governments have suspended the export of munitions and arms to Gulf countries involved in the war in Yemen.

In January, Norway suspended exports to the United Arab Emirates as a “precautionary line”, based on its assessment of the situation in Yemen, where a Saudi-led coalition including the UAE has been fighting Shia Houthi rebels for nearly three years now.

Days later, Germany followed, also stopping arms exports to countries involved in the Yemen war, where more than 10,000 people have been killed and another three million displaced, while a cholera epidemic is sweeping over the Arab world’s poorest country.

The paper written by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s CDU/CSU grouping and the Social Democrats states “the federal government, with immediate effect, will no longer export arms to countries as long as they are involved in the Yemeni war”.

Besides Norway and Germany, the Walloon regional authority in Belgium announced it would no longer authorise any licenses to the Ministry of Defence of Saudi Arabia for military equipment that could be used in the Yemen conflict.

The autonomous region has also suspended export licenses to the UAE. Walloon is one of three regional authorities in Belgium that can make independent arms transfer decisions. So is the tide turning – and will other European states follow these examples? …read the whole article