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The captain warned us that our plane would not take the usual path. We would not fly over Yemen this time, he told us, because he was avoiding Saudi Arabian jet fighters as they bombed that country into sand particles.
Let’s be honest, if the whole of Yemen were to be buried under the dunes, it would not affect the rand or our interest rates. In other words, it would do nothing to your savings. The whole country’s GDP was a paltry $36 billion in 2013, and that was before the war. To put it in perspective, Naspers, the owner of this newspaper, is worth $67 billion (R903 billion) today. So why, you may ask yourself, should you care about that country? Well, because of compassion for other human beings.
According to Ertharin Cousin, the executive director of the UN World Food Programme, the Saudi Arabian embargo does not allow for any food to get into Yemen, causing untold starvation. I saw pictures of a little girl who was burnt by a bomb, crying and scratching herself in a hospital without painkillers, because the Saudis would not allow even medicine into the country. The pictures brought to mind Stevie Wonder’s song Saturn: “Your strategy to peace is war. Killing helpless men, women and children.”
These days, countries label their enemies “terrorists” or “supporters of terrorism”, thereby giving themselves the licence to kill without impunity. There is no robust legal or moral framework to determine whether a guerrilla’s struggle for freedom is legitimate or not.
The UN, which was founded to be the agent of peace in the world, has turned into an agent of war. It too has joined the “terrorist” bandwagon. This is dangerous for the world because we know how flimsy popular opinion is. For example, successive UK and US governments called Nelson Mandela a terrorist for 27 years and, by the time he died, he was the darling of the world.
Late US president Dwight Eisenhower once famously warned America, and by extension the world, against the industrial military complex that has now captured the UN. Proponents of the war machine would disagree with him. They would point to the technological developments brought about by this partnership. They would tell us that many useful technologies, such the global positioning systems on our cellphones, are some of the dividends. The problem is, those who own the capital for destruction have become a law unto themselves. Like the basis of capitalism, their growth is dependent on creating new markets and finding new customers for their deadly products.
The collapse of the Soviet Union severely weakened the balance of power within the UN. The UN Security Council, which has veto powers, is dominated by the powers of yesteryear – France, the UK and Russia, who are master plunderers themselves. It is called the Security Council only because it secures their ill-gained loot. So if children are killed in countries such as Yemen, they don’t care. At the 70th UN Assembly, the Yemeni conflict was not even on the agenda – it was relegated to corridor and toilet talk.
Over the years, the Yemenis have accused the Saudi government of deliberately weakening their government by fuelling civil wars. At stake is a disputed boundary within which lie possible oil reserves.
Unlike Syrian refugees, Yemenis are not flocking into Europe – they are trapped. If they try to escape by boat, Saudi Arabia bombs them. The only option left is to try to cross the Rub’ al Khali, the largest contiguous sand desert in the world. In the safety of an aircraft, this is beautiful land – sand dunes as far as the eye can see, and therein lies its treachery. The sun is blazing hot and there is not a single tree to give you shade or even hang yourself from. Lakes dried up here 6 000 years ago.
The Yemenis have a stark choice: withstand the rain of fire caused by the Saudis’ latest weapons, or die of thirst while trying to find a safer place.
Believe it or not, the only thing that can defend them is compassion.
Kuzwayo is the founder of Ignitive,
an advertising agency
