© Campaign Against Arms Trade/flickr/cc
Human rights campaigners protest against Farnborough International arms fair on July 11, 2016.
, who's leading the U.S.-backed coalition's bombing campaign against the Houthi rebels in Yemen, faces opposition both on and off Capitol Hill.
In a
statement released Monday, U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Yemen Jamie McGoldrick said that
30 people were killed and 17 were wounded, with the casualties including first responders and two children, as a result of the airstrikes in the village of Beit Saadan in northern Yemen.
According to reporting by Reuters,
several workers drilling for water were killed in the first strike; then, in what is known as a double-tap strike, warplanes came back and hit those who had rushed out to help the workers.
"I remain deeply disturbed by the unrelenting attacks on civilians and on civilian infrastructure throughout Yemen by all parties to the conflict, which are further destroying Yemen's social fabric and increasing humanitarian needs, particularly for medical attention at a time when the health sector is collapsing," Goldrick said, and urged all parties involved to adhere to the April 10 ceasefire.
UN Human Rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein last month
called for an international investigation into human rights abuses in Yemen, saying the conflict was creating "devastating" toll on the country's population and that the "international community...has a legal and moral duty to take urgent steps to alleviate the appalling levels of human despair." International human rights groups have
made a similar call.
As Kristine Beckerle and John Sifton of Human Rights Watch
wrote last week,
"the U.S. continues to provide logistical, tactical, and intelligence support to the Saudi-led military operation against the Houthis and their allies in Yemen that has resulted in numerous laws-of-war violations."
Comment: The Syrian war is about the natural gas and oil pipelines: