HELL ON EARTH

Yemen Conflict: U.N. Says It Sees War Crimes Committed by All Parties

At least 6,660 civilians have been killed in civil war.

All sides—Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, seven other Arab states in their coalition, and government and rebel forces in Yemen—may have committed war crimes in the bloody Yemeni civil war, United Nations human-rights experts said Tuesday. At least 6,660 civilians have been killed and 10,563 injured in the fighting. In a new report, the experts allege that government forces, the Saudi-led coalition backing them, and the rebel Houthi movement failed to make sufficient efforts to minimize the number of civilian casualties. All sides are also accused of arbitrary detentions, torture, enforced disappearances, and recruiting children. Yemen has been devastated by a conflict that was sparked in early 2015 when rebel Houthis seized control of much of the west of the country and forced President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi to flee. The U.N. report says its monitors “have reasonable grounds to believe that individuals in the government of Yemen and the coalition may have conducted attacks in violation of the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution that may amount to war crimes.”