UNITED NATIONS, April 25 (RIA Novosti), Matthew Lee – For the first time in history, the UN envoy to Yemen Jamal Benomar not only acknowledged the issue of US drone strikes in his country, but tried to justify the deadly campaign in a closed door meeting of the UN Security Council.
In the past, Benomar has declined to answer questions about drones. Benomar attempted to justify the strikes after increased strikes this week including the reported killing of three civilian laborers.
Responding to a question, he said "this issue did come up in one of the interventions." But "there has been an increase in terrorist activities in Yemen, al-Qaeda occupied a whole province, Abyan, then retreated."
Benomar would not name the United States as a participant in the attacks, saying that "the government is working very closely with a number of countries in the context of counterterrorism."
The Washington-based New America Foundation has estimated that there were a minimum of 25 US drone strikes in Yemen in last year.
From Benomar’s comments it did not appear that the strikes will stop or slow down. "Yemen will need all the help it needs to support its efforts in the face of increased terrorist activities in Yemen," he said.
In the UN Human Rights Council, Pakistan sponsored a debate on drone strikes, which the US declined to attend by saying the issue of drones should be discussed in "other fora."
Drone strikes pose a great danger to the population of Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, as well as in Afghanistan.
