Istanbul, Dec. 14 (DHA) - The US Senate has passed a resolution calling for an end to US military support to the Saudi-led coalition in the Yemen war, and asserting Congress’s right to decide on matters of war and peace.
The measure, which passed by 56 votes to 41, marked the first time the Senate had invoked the 1973 War Powers Resolution to seek to curb the power of the president to take the US into an armed conflict. It marked a significant bipartisan rebuke to the Trump administration, which lobbied intensively against it.
The independent senator Bernie Sanders who had pushed the resolution persistently throughout the year, called it “a historic moment”:
“Today we declare we will not long participate in the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen which has caused the worst humanitarian crisis on earth, with 85,000 children starving to death. Today we tell the despotic regime in Saudi Arabia that we will no longer be part of their military adventurism.”
The resolution still faces serious obstacles to becoming law. The House of Representatives, controlled by Republicans for another month, is unlikely to endorse it. The Democrats will take over the House next month, but the legislative process of passing the resolution would have to begin again. Then it would face a certain veto from Donald Trump, which would require a two-thirds vote in both houses to overturn.