Martyn Day – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Martyn Day on 2016-01-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent steps he has taken to ensure that UK-made arms are not being used to commit human rights abuses in Yemen.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

We remain deeply concerned about the human rights situation in Yemen. We continue to raise the importance of compliance with International Humanitarian Law with all sides to the conflict.

The UK operates one of the most rigorous and transparent export control regimes in the world. All exports of arms and controlled military goods are assessed on a case-by-case basis against the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing, taking account of all relevant factors at the time of the application. Risks around human rights violations are a key part of our assessment against the Consolidated Criteria. A licence will not be issued, for any country, if to do so would be inconsistent with any provision of the mandatory Criteria.