It was interesting to read of the welcome conviction of three people for smuggling fighter jet parts to Iran, and in particular the comments of Simon York, “the director of HMRC’s fraud investigation service”, who was quoted as saying: “These three … didn’t care what these parts might be used for, as long as they got paid” (Report, 23 November).

Could a similar comment not be made about the various British arms manufacturers who continue to, with the full support of our government, sell arms to Saudi Arabia, a state that has played and is playing such a disastrously central role in Yemen’s civil war? A civil war that, as reported by the Guardian on Thursday, has resulted in the deaths of approximately 85,000 children under the age of five from malnutrition.

Alec Burt

London

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