Defenceweb | 25 March 2021 |

Smoke is rising from another apparent fire demanding the attention of Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan, this time involving Denel associate company Rheinmetall Denel Munition (RDM).

He has been asked for details of South Africa’s alleged involvement in the ongoing Yemen humanitarian crisis by Democratic Alliance (DA) parliamentarian Michele Clarke in her capacity as shadow deputy minister for Gordhan’s department.

She said South African arms companies, including RDM, profited by selling weapons to factions central in the humanitarian war in Yemen, aiding gross human rights violations in the country.

A number of South African weapons have turned up in Yemen’s civil war, Open Secrets has said in a new report. In its recently published document ‘Profiting From Misery – South Africa’s complicity in war crimes in Yemen’, Open Secrets said that several South African companies have ‘cashed in’ on weapons exports to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have led the campaign in Yemen.