'All parties could be guilty of war crimes'

Coalition air strikes have caused most civilian casualties. Pics/AFP

Three experts working for the UN's top human rights body say the governments of Yemen, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia may have been responsible for war crimes including rape, torture, disappearances and "deprivation of the right to life" during three-and-a-half years of escalated fighting against rebels in Yemen.

In their first report for the Human Rights Council, the experts also point to possible crimes by rebel Shiite militia in Yemen, who have been fighting the Saudi-led coalition and Yemen's government in a civil war since March 2015.

They urged the international community to "refrain from providing arms that could be used in the conflict" - an apparent reference to countries including the US and UK that help arm the Saudi-led coalition, as well as Iran.

'Ban killer robots'
Geneva: Countries should quickly agree a treaty banning the use of so-called killer robots, activists said. They say time is running out before weapons are deployed that use lethal force without a human making the final kill-order.

Iran sanctions legal, justified: US
The US told UN judges they had no jurisdiction to rule on Tehran's demand for them to order the suspension of nuclear-related sanctions against Iran. Iran has argued that Donald Trump breached a 1955 treaty with his decision to reimpose the sanctions after withdrawing from a multilateral nuclear accord.

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