‘Israel’ and Saudi Arabia on UN’s list of child-killing regimes
United Nations (QNN)- The United Nations has put Israel, and Saudi Arabia and its allies in their military campaign against Yemen on the world body’s blacklist of child killers.
According to a report by United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, in 2018, Israel killed 59 Palestinian children and another 2,756 were injured last year. Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen killed or injured 729 children, nearly half the total child casualties of the year.
The UN chief’s report, which was presented to the Security Council on Friday, states that Palestinian casualties caused by the Israeli regime hit a four-year high in 2018.
Guterres urged “Israel to immediately put in place preventive and protective measures to end the excessive use of force”.
“I condemn the increasing number of child casualties, which are often a result of attacks in densely populated areas and against civilian objects, including schools and hospitals,” Guterres said in the report, produced by UN Children and Armed Conflict envoy Virginia Gamba and issued in Guterres’ name.
The report, which does not subject those listed to action but rather shames parties to conflicts in the hope of pushing them to implement measures to protect children, has long been controversial with diplomats saying Saudi Arabia and Israel both exerted pressure in recent years in a bid to stay off the list.
