Iran Denies US Accusation of Yemen Arms Shipments
Iran's foreign ministry has rejected accusations from the United States that it has been shipping arms to the Shiite Huthi rebels in Yemen, according to media reports on Monday.
A US admiral said on Thursday that warships from the US Navy and allied nations had intercepted four weapons shipments from Iran to the Arabian Peninsula country since April 2005.
The shipments contained thousands of AK-47 assault rifles, anti-tank missiles, sniper rifles and "other pieces of other equipment, higher-end weapons systems," said Vice Admiral Kevin Donegan.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Ghassemi dismissed the claims.
"These accusations are totally false when... every day destructive arms, US bombs and missiles are dropped by the Arab coalition on the heads of defenceless civilians in schools, hospitals, prisons and homes in Yemen," he said, quoted in local media on Monday.
Ghassemi said the bombardment amounted to "war crimes".
The United States and Saudi Arabia have repeatedly accused Iran of arming the Huthis.
Yemen has been rocked by conflict since the Huthis overran Sanaa and other large parts of the country in 2014, prompting military intervention by a Saudi-led coalition in March last year in support of the internationally recognised government.
The conflict has killed nearly 7,000 people, wounded more than 35,000 and displaced at least three million since the Saudi-led coalition launched military operations, according to the United Nations.
31 October 2016, 16:58
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Empty accusations as always.. you can be sure that if they had really caught such shipments they would have unleashed all their media hounds on it.
Or maybe those were also "buried at sea" without any pictures or videos taken? Sounds familiar, must be from some hollywood movie or smtg...
31 October 2016, 17:08
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Actually, the admiral misspoke. The intercepted weapons shipments were smuggled into Yemen on Saudi Air Force F-15's. Alert intelligence work by Qatar and UAE detected the shipments concealed on the aircraft by persons unknown. The shipments were "intercepted" by their detonation along with legitimate munitions in Yemen. KSA's Minister of Pubic Integrity, Sheikh Juliano "Ralph" al Thani, told reporters during a recent ski holiday in his native Switzerland, "If we had not deployed these effective anti-terror munitions, the smuggled arms might have reached terrorists when our aircraft conducted normal training flights."
31 October 2016, 17:10
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Sheikh al Thani regrets the typographical error in the spelling of his title. Too clever by half or just clever enough?
