British refuelling support for Saudi fighter jets as fighting escalates in and around Yemen could make the United Kingdom complicit in further violations of international law, academics and civil society organisations have warned. In an open letter, they urged the government to halt military support for Saudi Arabia and pursue diplomacy instead.
British military support
The letter went to Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband. Its signatories said they were “deeply concerned” by the decision to refuel Royal Saudi Air Force aircraft as the conflict escalated. “There is a real risk that further UK military support for Saudi Arabia will not achieve the desired outcome and could make the UK complicit in further war crimes and violations of international humanitarian law,” they wrote.
The Campaign Against Arms Trade, Action on Armed Violence, Shadow World Investigations UK and the Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation signed the letter. Academics and specialists in international relations, human rights and international law also signed, including scholars from the universities of Oxford, Bristol, Westminster, Sussex, King’s College London, Warwick, Royal Holloway and Northumbria.
The signatories called British backing for Saudi military action in Yemen longstanding. That action began in 2015, with a coalition of Arab states initially taking part. Figures cited in the letter show the Yemen Data Project recorded 25,054 Saudi-led coalition air raids between 2015 and 2022.
Air raids and civilian harm
The organisations said extensive evidence showed the air campaign had hit civilians and civilian infrastructure. They also cited the war’s air and sea blockade, economic collapse and ground fighting. By the end of 2021, the conflict had killed 377,000 people directly and indirectly, according to a United Nations Development Programme estimate cited in the letter. The groups also pointed to allegations that the Saudi-led coalition used starvation as a weapon.
The groups said the Saudi-led intervention had failed to defeat or dislodge the Houthis, who still control most of Yemen’s population. They also criticised Britain’s role in U.S. airstrikes against the Houthis in spring 2025, which the UK reportedly supported with refuelling. A Pentagon assessment cited by the signatories said the strikes between March and May 2025 “more likely than not” caused 281 civilian casualties.
Calls for de-escalation
A wider regional crisis accompanied the latest escalation. Reports cited in the letter said fighting had displaced around 130,000 people in recent weeks and caused 110 casualties, including 28 deaths. Signatories also raised concerns about Houthi attacks and attempted attacks on civilian infrastructure in Saudi Arabia. They linked the latest escalation to developments inside Yemen, the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran and the war in Gaza.
“Past experience has shown that air strikes will not contribute to defeating the Houthis or alleviating pressure on Saudi Arabia or on global shipping routes,” the signatories wrote. “Instead, the UK is only further fuelling the war and is risking complicity in further crimes.”
They urged the British government to stay out of Saudi military operations and use diplomacy to de-escalate the conflict. “In light of Saudi Arabia’s extensive record of violations in Yemen, we urge your government not to involve itself in Saudi operations and focus on de-escalatory diplomacy,” they wrote.
The organisations argued diplomacy, rather than more military support, offered a path towards peace in Yemen and could help reduce the wider economic consequences of the region’s interconnected wars. Their warning centred on Britain’s role: refuelling Saudi aircraft, they said, risks drawing the UK further into military operations that have failed to defeat the Houthis and caused civilian harm.