BRITISH anti-war campaigners have held an online rally with their international counterparts to call for unified global action against the war in Yemen, which has caused the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

On Monday evening, tens of thousands of people joined the rally, organised by the Stop the War Coalition and the Yemeni Alliance Committee, on Facebook, YouTube and Zoom.

Speakers included Yemeni-born former British army soldier Ahmed al-Babati, ex-Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, French MP Daniele Obono, US philosopher Dr Cornel West, Greek MP Yanis Varoufakis and US Congressman Ro Khanna.

The bombing of Yemen, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, has led to the death of 250,000 people. 

It is estimated that more than 24 million will need humanitarian aid this year due to the ongoing conflict.

Labour MP Apsana Begum said: “The British government recently topped up the budget for the Ministry of Defence. 

“With huge numbers of the population living in various forms of poverty [in Britain], how else would the government continue to prop up the richest in our society if they were not making money from selling arms?

“But [Britain’s] continued inclusion in this horrible conflict is not just a money-making exercise, it’s also an exercise in imperial power.”

She called on campaigners to “resist the narrative” that this country’s global influence is “something to cherish” and instead argue that “this power must be used by Britain to spread and promote peace across this world.”

Mr Babati, who staged a protesting outside Downing Street, said that he had become angry and frustrated with his role. 

“The same government that were arming and supporting and fuelling this war was the same government that expected a Yemeni like myself, a soldier, to fight for them and protect them,” he said.

Mr Babati warned that only united action could end the war that is starving and and killing Yemen’s people.

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) general secretary Kate Hudson said: “We really have to face up to the truth that our government is playing a really significant and major role in this terrible, terrible catastrophe.

“We must force our government to change track. We have to put all the energy, all the power of our movement behind that demand in the same way that we did at the time of the war on
Iraq.”

Mr Corbyn highlighted the importance of international action, insisting: “A global movement can stop the war in Yemen, it can stop the arms supplies and can stop the killing of people in Yemen. 

“But it does require us to have the confidence of our unity, the confidence of our strength, the confidence of a vision of a world that isn’t based on weaponry and war and conflict but instead is on creating a more civilised world where we deal with the issues and the problems that we all face.

“Above all, in our unity, don’t just come together to oppose the war in Yemen as we’re doing today, come together to oppose the rise of the far right and racism all around the world.”