UK's Saudi Weapons Sales Unlawful, Lords Committee Finds

THE GUARDIAN: Report finds UK arms ‘highly likely to be cause of significant civilian casualties in Yemen’

The UK is on “the wrong side of the law” by sanctioning arms exports to Saudi Arabia for the war in Yemen and should suspend some of the export licences, an all-party Lords committee has said.

The report by the international relations select committee says ministers are not making independent checks to see if arms supplied by the UK are being used in breach of the law, but is instead relying on inadequate investigations by the Saudis, its allies in the war.

It describes the humanitarian plight of Yemenis as “unconscionable”. » | Patrick Wintour, Diplomatic editor | Saturday, February 16, 2019

White House Covering Up Weapons Pipeline in Syria

Uprising in Saudi Arabia? America Won’t Allow It

THE FIRST POST: Alexander Cockburn: There’ll be little talk in Washington of democracy in action if Shia protests catch hold

POSE a threat to the stability of Saudi Arabia, as Shia protesters are said to to have done in Awamiya, according to reports this week from the country's oil-rich Eastern Province, and you're brandishing a scalpel over the very heart of long-term US policy in the Middle East.

The US consumes about 19 million barrels of oil every 24 hours, about half of them imported. At 25 per cent, Canada is the lead supplier. Second comes Saudi Arabia with 12 per cent. But supply of crude oil to the US is only half the story. Saudi Arabia controls OPEC's oil price and adjusts it carefully with US priorities in the front of their minds.

The traffic is not one-way. In the half-century after 1945, the United States sold the Saudis about $100 billion in military goods and services. A year ago the Obama administration announced the biggest weapons deal in US history – a $60 billion programme with Saudi Arabia to sell it military equipment across the next 20 to 30 years.

Under its terms, the United States will provide Saudi Arabia with 84 advanced F-15 fighter planes with electronics and weapons packages tailored to Saudi needs. An additional 70 F-15's already in Saudi hands will be upgraded to match the capabilities of the new planes.

Saudi Arabia will purchase a huge fleet of nearly 200 Apache, Blackhawk and other US military helicopters, along with a vast array of radar systems, anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles, and guided bombs. The US trains and supplies all Saudi Arabia's security forces. US corporations have huge investments in the Kingdom. Read on and comment » | Alexander Cockburn | Friday, October 07, 2011

Weapons Sales to Syria 'Increase'
Various weapons are available on Lebanon's black market, and arms trading is reportedly on the rise since the unrest in Syria began. Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr reports from Beirut

Ni armes aux rebelles, ni soldats au sol en Libye, dit Longuet
REUTERS FRANCE: PARIS - La France n'a pas déployé en Libye de troupes au sol dans le cadre des opérations de la coalition internationale contre les forces du colonel Mouammar Kadhafi, a déclaré jeudi le ministre de la Défense.

Lors d'un point de presse à son ministère, Gérard Longuet a ajouté que la livraison d'armes au rebelles libyens, aux prises avec les forces de Kadhafi, n'était "pas à l'ordre du jour".

"Il y a une limite technique dans la résolution 1973, c'est qu'il n'y a pas d'occupation au sol", a-t-il dit, précisant qu'un envoyé spécial à Benghazi, fief des insurgés, constituait pour l'heure la seule présence française sur le sol libyen.

Gérard Longuet s'est rendu cette semaine à bord du porte-avions Charles-de-Gaulle au large des côtes libyennes, d'où partent une partie des avions engagés dans l'opération armée contre les forces de Mouammar Kadhafi, en vertu de la résolution 1973 des Nations unies adoptée le 17 mars.

Interrogé sur l'hypothèse d'une assistance militaire ou de livraisons d'armes à l'opposition libyenne, le ministre a répondu: "Une telle assistance n'est pas à l'ordre du jour parce qu'elle n'est pas compatible avec la résolution 1973." » | Elizabeth Pineau, édité par Patrick Vignal | Jeudi 31 Mars 2011

Inside Story: Steps towards Peace in Libya

Moscow "Alarmed" by Reports of Al-Qaeda Presence in Libyan Opposition
RUSSIA TODAY: As Washington considers arming the Libyan opposition against the government of Muammar Gaddafi, Russia fears it might be putting weapons into the hands of the world’s most notorious terrorist group.

Moscow officials on Wednesday expressed alarm that al-Qaeda may be working inside the ranks of the Libyan opposition. “Quite alarming reports are coming, which say that al-Qaeda elements could very likely be present among the opposition forces,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters at a news conference. “This certainly alarms us.” Lavrov added that the “plague” in the form of al-Qaeda terrorism could “spread all over the region and not only there."

The Russian foreign minister was certainly referring to the possibility that any arms delivered to the Libyan opposition could all-too-easily slip into the hands of fundamentalists and extremists. » | Robert Bridge, RT | Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Tehran Accused of Arming Taleban with Weapons and Explosives
TIMES ONLINE: The Iranian Government has been accused by Afghan and Western officials of delivering tonnes of weaponry to the Taleban, including plastic explosives, mortars, grenades and technical manuals.

Weapons and documents shown to Channel 4 News indicate that more than ten tonnes of weapons have been intercepted at Iran’s desert border with Afghanistan in the past year, with a tonne and a half recovered in the past week.

The reports come as General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, warned the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Iran also provided a base for al-Qaeda operatives. Afghanistan’s intelligence agency estimates that about 60 per cent of the weaponry it has intercepted from Iran has been supplied by the Iranian Government rather than black market dealers.

In a report on Iran’s weapons smuggling to the Taleban — to be aired by Channel 4 News this evening — one Afghan Taleban commander claims that the Iranian border is assuming greater importance than that into Pakistan. >>> Tom Coghlan | Thursday, March 18, 2010

Rageh Omaar on Why the West Should Fear the Taliban and al-Qaeda's Hold on Pakistan
THE TELEGRAPH: Stronghold of both the Taliban and al-Qaeda, the wild and lawless tribal border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan forms the crucial battleground in the war on terror. Rageh Omaar reports from the front line.

Supporters of Pro-Taliban cleric Sufi Muhammad march in Swat's main city of Mingora, Photo (AP) courtesy of The Telegraph
”Over the past two years, I have noticed that there is such a hatred of anything to do with the West throughout much of the tribal areas that the region has changed dramatically…

…Pakistan represents the first realistic prospect for a jihadist movement to capture a nation-state, or at the very least to control large parts of it. It would, in effect, mean that militants would have something approaching a mini-state within the country where the central government's power and influence would be non-existent, and from which they could plan and launch attacks beyond its borders. And Pakistan is not just any nation-state at threat from militant groups, but one that has nuclear weapons, a large population and economic resources; one that borders a vulnerable failed state in Afghanistan where tens of thousands of Nato forces are stationed; and one that also has as its neighbours two emerging economic superpowers, China and India. What is more, Pakistan has a long coastline open to the most economically important stretch of waterway in the world, the Gulf, from which hundreds of tankers supply oil-hungry economies. It is a nightmare scenario from which no country is immune. None of us will escape the consequences of a situation where large parts of Pakistan are politically, militarily and economically controlled by jihadists." – Rageh Omaar

The stark mountainous northern regions of Pakistan's tribal areas are among the most beautiful landscapes in the world. Yet as Barack Obama's newly appointed special envoy to the region, the famously tough and straight-talking diplomat Richard Holbrooke, has said, Pakistan is the country that scares President Obama and keeps him awake at night more than any other.

On my assignments to Pakistan in the past two years, it has been hard to believe the country's nightmare could get any worse. It has been heartbreaking to see this nation of more than 170 million people convulsed by political violence that its government seems increasingly incapable of halting. From the assassination of Benazir Bhutto to the almost weekly suicide bomb attacks that go unnoticed by the outside world, every strike by the militants is more audacious than the previous one.

The ambush of the Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore at the beginning of this month came at the same time that the four main Taliban groups in Pakistan announced their decision to unite their forces in a concerted military campaign against Nato and government forces in neighbouring Afghanistan. Cricket, as many have observed, is one of the few cultural and sporting pastimes in which all Pakistanis, regardless of class, regional, ethnic or sectarian traditions, can unite around. It is a sport that both the religiously conservative and the Westernised elite enjoy. The aim of the militant attack on Lahore was to undermine this; to make the point that nothing is immune from political violence and that the Taliban's vision for Pakistan is an absolutist one with no room for anything Western, or anything that isn't derived from their literal interpretation of Islam.

More and more of Pakistan is slipping beyond the control of the government. As the Lahore attack showed, even the centres of major cities are vulnerable. Nowhere is the absence of the rule of law more evident than the north-west of Pakistan. The region is officially known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, a clunky but accurate description of this vast expanse of nearly 11,000 square miles, home to an estimated seven million people whose first loyalty is not to Pakistan but to their tribal community. As its name indicates, this region is nominally administered by the Pakistani government but it has been autonomous and unconquered for centuries. >>> By Rageh Omaar | Thursday, March 19, 2009

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