Saudi Arabia using US-made cluster bombs in Yemen: HRW
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Two BLU-108 canisters, one with two skeet (submunitions) still attached, is seen in the al-Amar area of al-Safraa in Sa’ada Province, northern Yemen, after an attack on April 27, 2015.
Human Rights Watch (HR) has criticized the US for selling cluster munitions to Saudi Arabia, urging Riyadh to stop using such banned arms that leave behind unexploded sub-munitions and endanger civilians.
On Friday, Steve Goose, arms director at HRW and chair of the Cluster Munition Coalition, an international coalition of groups working to eradicate cluster munitions, called on Washington to stop producing and selling the internationally-banned weapons in compliance with international law.
“The US has sold Saudi Arabia cluster munitions, a weapon most countries have rejected due to the harm they cause civilians,” said Goose, adding “Saudi Arabia should stop using cluster munitions in Yemen or anywhere else, and the US should stop producing and exporting them.”
Goose went on to say that Saudi Arabia has used various types of US-made cluster munitions, including CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapons, in its war against Yemen despite evidence of mounting civilian casualties.
Experts say CBU-105 is designed to explode above the ground and project an explosively formed jet of metal and fragmentation downward. The cluster ammunition is equipped with electronic self-destruct and self-deactivation features.
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have both received CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapons from the US in recent years. The US also provided Saudi Arabia with significant exports of other cluster bombs between 1970 and 1999.
The New York-based leading international rights groups also say the US has endangered many civilian lives by selling the cluster bombs to Riyadh regime.
This comes as internationally-banned cluster munitions supplied by the United States have numerously been used in the relentless war.
In the past year, HRW documented civilian casualties in Yemen from the use of four types of US-made air-dropped and ground-launched cluster munitions against Yemenis. This includes using CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapons in at least six airstrikes in the Yemeni provinces of Amran, Hodaida, Sa’ada and Sana’a.
In Mid February, a CBU-105 attack was recorded on camera, at a cement factory in Amran Province, 40 kilometers northwest of the capital, Sana’a.
The US has backed the Saudi campaign in Yemen. In November last year, Washington approved a $1.29 billion rearming program for Riyadh, including thousands of similar bombs.
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