Amnesty International calls on US to stop selling MQ-9B aerial drones to UAE

SANAA, Nov. 10 (YPA) – Amnesty International has called on the United States to stop the sale of 18 sophisticated armed MQ-9B aerial drones to the United Arab Emirates, in light of evidence that civilians have been killed in attacks in war-torn Yemen and Libya.

Philippe Nassif, the advocacy director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty, said in a statement on Monday that the US risked “complicity in likely war crimes in Yemen”.

The startling fact that the United States government continues its unflinching support of providing weapons that risk adding to the devastating toll of Yemeni civilians… should shake to the core every person living in this country,” Nassif said.

“The United States must resolutely refrain from supplying weapons that could be used in the conflict and not transfer weaponry to the UAE, or risk complicity in likely war crimes in Yemen.”

The US State Department gave Congress notification of the planned $2.9bn sale last week, and the move comes on the heels of a previous notification of a potential sale of F-35 fighter jets to the UAE, Reuters reported.

Yemeni activists on social media demanded that the deal be stopped, which they saw as a statement to the UAE to carry out its violations against civilians and innocent people in various countries, especially since the UAE has a black history of indiscriminate bombing that does not  care about civilians.

E.M