Envoy rejects Saudi Arabia’s letter to UN as false

EghtesadOnline: Iran's Permanent Representative to the UN Gholamali Khoshrou categorically dismissed a letter by Saudi Arabia to the UN Security Council on Iran’s dispatch of arms to Yemen.

News ID: ۷۳۷۲۴۸

29 September 2016

“Iran has not had policies on dispatching arms for Ansarullah fighters,” Khoshrou said in his letter to the UN Security Council on Wednesday.

The Iranian envoy said that the Saudi Arabia’s letter included unsubstantiated claims that have not been verified by any independent entity.

“These claims are raised against the numerous confirmed reports, documenting Saudi Arabia’s war crimes and violation of international law and international humanitarian law.”

According to IRNA, the following is Ambassador Khoshrou's letter to the UN Security Council President:

In the name of God, the most Compassionate, the most Merciful

No: 1039
27 September 2016

H. E. Mr. Gerard van Bohemen
President of the Security Council
United Nations
New York
Excellency,

Upon instructions from my Government, and with reference to the letter dated 16 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 afore-mentioned letter concerning the alleged transfer of weapons to Yemeni Ansarullah fighters and the violation of the United Nations Security Council Resolutions.

This 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 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, specially children and women, as well as Coalition’s engagement in violating international law and international humanitarian law, including Security Council Resolution 2286.

According to the latest survey conducted by human rights activists and academics, Saudi Arabia has targeted 3,158 non-military sites in Yemen between March 2015 and the end of August 2016. The findings further reveals 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.

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.
Gholamali Khoshrou