Equipo Nizkor - S/2016/817 - Letter from Iran rejecting the Saudi accusations concerning the alleged transfer of weapons to Yemeni Ansarullah fighters.

United Nations
Security Council

S/2016/817

Distr.: General
29 September 2016
Original: English

Letter dated 27 September 2016 from the Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations addressed to the President of the Security Council

Upon instructions from my Government, and with reference to the letter dated 14 September 2016 from the Permanent Representative of Saudi Arabia to the United Nations addressed to the President of the Security Council (S/2016/786), I wish to bring the following to your attention:

The Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran firmly rejects the pure fabrications and unsubstantiated allegations contained in the aforementioned letter concerning the alleged transfer of weapons to Yemeni Ansarullah fighters and the violation of the United Nations Security Council resolutions.

That letter and the claims contained therein are at the same time quite astounding, as the claimant is the representative of a Government that has invaded Yemen and used, for about a year and a half, a full variety of lethal weapons against Yemen's civilians and civilian infrastructure. Numerous reports, by the United Nations and other authoritative institutions, have so far documented the crimes committed by the Saudi-led coalition against Yemeni civilians, especially children and women, as well as the coalition's engagement in violating international law and international humanitarian law, including Security Council resolution 2286 (2016).

According to the latest survey conducted by human rights activists and academics, Saudi Arabia targeted 3,158 non-military sites in Yemen between March 2015 and the end of August 2016. The findings further reveal that there were 942 air raids on residential areas, 114 on markets, 34 on mosques, 147 on schools, 26 on universities and 378 on transport sites during the same period. |1|

The air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition yesterday, 26 September 2016, on a Yemeni hospital supported by Doctors without Borders, during which at least 11 people were killed and 19 injured, are the latest in a series of ceaseless attacks on civilian targets in Yemen. The bombing of a school in northern Yemen, on 13 August 2016, is another example, during which 10 children died and 28 were injured.

The Islamic Republic of Iran has always reiterated that there could be no military solution to this war and has urged for an end to hostilities and a peaceful resolution of this conflict through negotiations and the utilization of peaceful mechanisms.

I should be grateful if you would have the present letter circulated as a document of the Security Council.

(Signed) Gholamali Khoshroo
Ambassador
Permanent Representative

Notes:

1. The Guardian, 23 September 2016. [Back]

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29Sep16

Letter from Iran rejecting the Saudi accusations concerning the alleged transfer of weapons to Yemeni Ansarullah fighters