ReliefWeb

On February 25, 2019, a group of nine civil society organizations released an open letter to UN Secretary-General António Guterres urging him to list the Saudi and Emirati-led Coalition (SELC) in the annexes of his upcoming 2019 annual report on children and armed conflict. The letter calls on the Secretary-General to include the SELC in ‘list A’ of his annexes for all relevant violations, including attacks on schools and hospitals, in order to ensure a credible, accurate listing of perpetrators. Accurate listing would also to provide the UN with the foundation to enter into dialogue with the SELC to drive change for children through the signing and implementation of a time-bound action plan. The letter includes documentation of three of the five ‘trigger’ violations for listing – killing and maiming, attacks on schools and hospitals, and recruitment and use – carried out in Yemen in 2018 by the SELC.