US President Donald Trump on Wednesday vetoed three congressional resolutions barring billions of dollars in weapons sales to countries, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The resolutions “would weaken America’s global competitiveness and damage the important relationships we share with our allies and partners,” Trump said in letters to the US Senate.
It is the third time that the president has employed his veto power since taking office.
The measures cleared the US Congress this month after the Trump administration approved the sales in May.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had said the administration was responding to an emergency caused by Iran.
However, lawmakers said there were no legitimate grounds to circumvent Congress, which has the right to disapprove arms sales.
US Senator Lindsey Graham last month delivered a stinging rebuke to Riyadh, saying he hoped his vote against the sales would “send a signal to Saudi Arabia that if you act the way you’re acting, there is no space for a strategic relationship.”
The senator was referring to last year’s murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey, allegedly at the hands of Saudi Arabian agents.
Critics say the arms sales would aggravate the war in Yemen, where Saudi Arabia is leading a US-backed coalition that also includes the UAE in a battle against the Iranian-supported Houthi rebels.
The UN says the conflict has triggered the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
Trump on Wednesday said that barring the sale of US weapons “would likely prolong the conflict in Yemen and deepen the suffering it causes” and that “without precision-guided munitions, more — not fewer — civilians are likely to become casualties.”
He also pointed to Iran in justifying blocking the resolutions.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE are “a bulwark against the malign activities of Iran and its proxies in the region” and the arms sale licenses Congress sought to block enhance their “ability to deter and defend against these threats,” he said.
Tensions between Washington and Tehran have soared since Trump last year pulled the US out of a deal with Iran that was aimed at curbing its nuclear program and imposed punishing sanctions.
The US has said it brought down one and possibly two Iranian drones last week, and has blamed Iran for a series of attacks on tanker ships in strategic Persian Gulf waters.
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