Iran Press/Middle East: After being extended multiple times, Germany’s ban on arms exports to Saudi Arabia will once again be up for discussion.
Some European nations have halted weapons sales to Riyadh after it launched a military campaign in 2015 in neighboring Yemen, which the United Nations now calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
“The idea that weapon sales were stopped to Saudi Arabia because of the Yemen war I think is illogical,” said Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir.
“We think it’s wrong because we think the war in Yemen is a legitimate war. It’s a war that we were forced into it,” he told the German press agency DPA.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition agreed in March 2018 to prevent arms from being delivered to any country directly involved in the war in Yemen.
Before the ban, Germany did brisk business with the kingdom with an export volume of 450m euros ($550m) in the third fiscal quarter of 2017, according to German broadcaster Deutsche Welle.
Saudi Arabia has been at war in Yemen since March 2015, when a coalition led by the oil-rich kingdom launched a campaign of aerial bombardment aimed at countering Ansarollah and reinstating the ousted president Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi.
“We can buy weapons from a number of countries, and we do so. Saying we’re not going to sell weapons to Saudi Arabia doesn’t make a difference to us,” said al-Jubeir.
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