Arms Sales to Saudi Arabia

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 11:07 am on 28 January 2016.

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Photo of Tobias Ellwood Tobias Ellwood The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs 11:07, 28 January 2016

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. On the first point that this is seen as the forgotten war, this came up in the International Development Committee hearing yesterday. That almost does seem to be the case. It is perhaps a very sad reflection of the challenges we face, not just in the middle east but in Ukraine too. It is important that the international community does not turn its back on what is going on there. The scale of the humanitarian catastrophe that could be unveiled would be much bigger than what we see in Syria, Iraq or anywhere else. We need to focus on that.

On the second part of my hon. Friend’s question, she is absolutely right that the war is not contained in the country itself. Every single day, there are missile attacks from the Houthi-operated northern area of Yemen into southern Saudi Arabia. Over 300 Saudi Arabians have been killed because of what is going on there. That should not be ignored.