Calls to End Yemen War Renewed after US Senate Bill Failure
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Human rights advocates and Yemeni activists are voicing their frustration after a US Senate resolution to end the United States' involvement in the destructive and deadly war in Yemen was rejected.
The Senate voted 55-44 on Tuesday against the motion, which called for an end to US military aid to Saudi-led coalition forces fighting in Yemen that had not been directly approved by Congress.
The motion stated the US has provided Saudi-led forces with "aerial targeting assistance, intelligence sharing, and mid-flight aerial refueling", and assistance in aerial targeting and the coordination of military and intelligence activities, according to Al Jazeera.
Saudi Arabia launched a military offensive in Yemen in 2015. Its stated purpose was to root out Yemen's Houthi rebels, who had taken over the country's capital, Sana’a, and forced out Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
In recent comments, a minister departing from Hadi's government said the Saudi-led coalition has deviated from its objectives in the war-torn country.
The sovereign Yemeni decision has been taken away from the people, Salah al-Sayadi said after his resignation on Wednesday, just days after he said that Hadi was under house arrest in the Saudi capital, Riyadh.
In another development, Houthi fighters said they have hit a warplane belonging to the Saudi-led coalition while flying over the Yemeni northern province of Saada on Wednesday.
"Our air defense forces fired a missile and hit an F-15 plane over Saada," the group said in a statement posted on Saba news agency.
More than 10,000 Yemenis have been killed since the war began, tens of thousands have been wounded, and another two million people have been displaced.
Living under what has been described as the gravest humanitarian crisis in decades, Yemenis face severe food, water and medicine shortages, and a devastating outbreak of cholera, which has affected nearly one million people.
