US Secretary of State John Kerry has reiterated Washington's support for Saudi Arabia’s ongoing war on Yemen, which has so far claimed the lives of at least 8,000 people.
Kerry, who spoke in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, after attending a meeting with his Saudi counterpart Adel al-Jubeir on Saturday, said the Saudi decision to launch airstrikes in Yemen was aimed at dealing with the Ansarullah movement and al-Qaeda operatives in the Arab country.
Saudi Arabia’s military attacks against Yemen, which started in late March, have so far claimed the lives of more than 8,270 people and injured over 16,000 others.
Earlier this month, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was “deeply concerned” about Saudi Arabia’s intensification of airstrikes in residential areas and on civilian buildings in the Yemeni capital and warned that Riyadh’s use of cluster bombs in Sana’a, may amount to a “war crime.”
The Saudi strikes are supposedly meant to undermine the Ansarullah movement and restore power to fugitive former Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
Ansarullah fighters took control of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, in September 2014 and are currently in control of large parts of the country. They said the government of the fugitive former president was incapable of properly running the affairs of the country and containing the growing wave of corruption and terror.
Kerry further expressed concern about what he described as Iranian “interference” in other countries, including Yemen.
"The United States remains concerned about some of the activities that Iran is engaged in other countries," like Yemen, Syria and Lebanon, he said.
The top diplomat further reassured America's Persian Gulf Arab allies that Washington “will stand with them against any external threat."
"Let me assure everybody that the relationship between the United States and the GCC nations ([Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council) is one that is built on mutual interest, on mutual defense and I think there is no doubt whatsoever in the minds of the countries that make up the GCC that the United States will stand with them against any external threat," Kerry told reporters.
/257
source : Agencies
Saturday
23 January 2016
2:57:57 PM
731631
US Secretary of State John Kerry has reiterated Washington's support for Saudi Arabia’s ongoing war on Yemen, which has so far claimed the lives of at least 8,000 people.