CAIRO (AP) — An investigation team with the Saudi-led coalition said on Saturday that wrong information led to the lethal bombing of a packed funeral in the Yemeni capital Sanaa last weekend, which killed around 140 people and wounded more than 600. The inquiry team concluded that “a party affiliated to the Yemeni presidency of the General Chief of Staff wrongly passed information that there was a gathering of armed Huthi leaders in a known location in Sanaa, and insisted that the location be targeted immediately as a legitimate military target. “The Air Operations Centre in Yemen directed a close air support mission to target the location without obtaining approval from the coalition command to support legitimacy and without following the coalition command’s precautionary measures to ensure that the location is not a civilian one that may not be targeted.” “Appropriate action... must be taken against those who caused the incident, and... compensation must be offered to the families of the victims.” The strike was one of the deadliest in the coalition's nearly 19-month-old bombing campaign in support of Yemen’s beleaguered government. “JIAT has found that because of non-compliance with Coalition rules of engagement (ROEs) and procedures, and the issuing of incorrect information a Coalition aircraft wrongly targeted the location, resulting in civilian deaths and injuries,” it said.
Saudi Arabia accepts the finding of the Joint Incidents Assessment Team, a setup of coalition states to investigate complaints against coalitions conduct in Decisive Storm, that the October 8 coalition’s bombardment at a funeral ceremony in Sana'a, in which over 140 people were killed and more than 600 injured, was based on wrong information.