UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia unlawful, court of appeal declares

British arms sales to Saudi Arabia have been declared unlawful by the court of appeal because ministers failed to properly assess their contribution to civilian casualties in indiscriminate bombing in Yemen.

The unexpected ruling has prompted the British government to suspend new arms sales to Saudi Arabia while it urgently reviews its processes – although Liam Fox, the international trade secretary, has said the government would also seek to appeal.

The appeal court judges had been asked by Campaign Against Arms Trade whether the UK’s sales of arms to Saudi Arabia for use in the Yemeni civil war was in breach of its own international humanitarian law guidance.

They concluded that the decision making process was “wrong in law in one significant respect” and told Fox to launch an immediate review over concerns that British licensed bombs were killing civilians in Yemen.

Announcing the court’s decision, Sir Terence Etherton, the master of the rolls, said the government “made no concluded assessments of whether the Saudi-led coalition had committed violations of international humanitarian law in the past, during the Yemen conflict, and made no attempt to do so”.

Related: ‘The Saudis couldn’t do it without us’: the UK’s true role in Yemen’s deadly war

Etherton, sitting alongside Lord Justice Irwin and Lord Justice Singh, said ministers must now reconsider the arms sales approval process and “must then estimate the future risks” of breaches to international humanitarian law “in light of their conclusions about the past”.

Shortly after the ruling Fox made an emergency statement to the Commons and confirmed that the government would seek to appeal. “We are carefully considering the implications of the judgment for decision-making,” Fox told MPs.

“While we do this, we will not grant any new licences for export to Saudi Arabia and its coalition partners which might be used in the conflict in Yemen,” the minister added.

Later, Fox was understood to be privately telling MPs that he expected the review process called for by the court would take about 10 weeks – and would not lead to any of the previous licensing decisions being overturned.

Arms trade campaigners say that Paveway, Brimstone and Storm Shadow bombs of the type used by the Saudis in Yemen are covered by separate “open licences”, which have not been suspended by Fox, and are only under review. “The bombs will continue,” one source added.

Arms export licensing decisions of the type held to be unlawful are made by the international trade secretary on the advice of the foreign secretary, a post currently held by Jeremy Hunt and previously by Boris Johnson.

Earlier this month it emerged that Johnson had recommended that the UK allow Saudi Arabia to buy bomb parts expected to be deployed in Yemen, days after an airstrike on a potato factory in the country had killed 14 people in 2016.

Labour called for a full parliamentary or public inquiry into arms sales to the Gulf kingdom. The party’s leader, Jeremy Corbyn, added: “UK advice, assistance and arms supplies to Saudi’s war in Yemen is a moral stain on our country. Arms sales to Saudi must stop now.”

Lloyd Russell-Moyle, a Labour backbench MP who was in court for the ruling, blamed past and present British foreign secretaries and other ministers for ignoring the evidence of civilian casualties.

Focusing on Johnson, the Tory leadership frontrunner, Russell-Moyle added: “This goes right to the top of the Tory party.”

The UK has licensed the sale of at least £4.7bn worth of arms to Saudi Arabia since the start of the civil war in Yemen in March 2015, with most of the recorded sales taking place before 2018.

Both Johnson and Hunt have defended the UK’s arms relationship with Riyadh, although other European countries have halted sales. Germany said it would no longer supply arms following the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in Istanbul last autumn.

Latest figures estimate that the death toll in the complex civil war in Yemen since 2016 is fast approaching 100,000 – although there is currently a partial ceasefire – with nearly 11,700 civilians killed in attacks that have directly targeted them.

Estimates say that two-thirds of the civilian deaths were caused by the Saudi-led coalition; the rest were victims of actions by the Houthi rebels they are fighting.

Andrew Smith of Campaign Against Arms Trade called on ministers to halt the arms sales immediately. “It should never have taken a court case brought by campaigners to force the government to follow its own rules.

“No matter what atrocities it has inflicted, the Saudi regime has been able to count on the uncritical political and military support of the UK,” Smith added.

The Saudi foreign minister, Adel al-Jubeir, speaking in London, said: “The only people that will benefit from the ending of arms sales to Saudi Arabia will be ‘the death to America’ crowd.”