Chairman of National Human Rights Committee (NHRC) Dr Ali bin Smaikh al-Marri highlighted the humanitarian catastrophe resulting from the siege on Qatar.
 He noted that the siege countries targeted Gulf citizens and residents in all aspects, including health, education, work and social spheres, stressing that the crisis was fabricated to legitimise humanitarian violations that has become open and clear to all.
This came during the meeting of Dr al-Marri in London yesterday with Karen Pierce, Director-General (political), UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office, as part of a series of tours he has been making since the beginning of the crisis with officials of foreign affairs and human rights in the European capitals and the United States.
In the meeting, Dr al-Marri gave an explanation to the British official on the latest developments of the Gulf crisis. He pointed out that the siege countries continue to violate human rights, in a flagrant disregard of international conventions, including even the right to practice religious rites, for political differences.
He reviewed the broad steps of the National Human Rights Committee to combat these violations at all international forums and urged the competent organisations to fulfil their international and moral responsibilities towards these violations.
He called on the British Foreign Office to continue its role and international duty towards this crisis through its human rights mechanisms together with international organisations to condemn these violations and make efforts to end them.
Dr al-Marri noted that neutrality is unacceptable when thousands of people are threatened. “We cannot be impartial in cases of violations, and silence about them is not only a denial of international conventions but a denial of international principles and ethics,” he added.
Dr al-Marri expressed deep dissatisfaction with the outcome of the recent meeting of the ministers of the siege countries in Manama, and said that the Manama meeting complicated the crisis further, and prolonged the violations. The Chairman of the National Human Rights Committee praised the great role played by British journalists’ organisations and syndicates in combating the violations resulting from the siege on Qatar.
Dr al-Marri also praised the great international sympathy with those affected by the siege crisis, including the citizens of Qatar, residents of the country,  citizens of the GCC countries and the rest of the other nationalities, in addition to the great response that he has received during his tours of many European capitals and the great support of the media and major press organisations and their condemnation of the demands of the closure of the Qatari TV channels and the violation of freedom of opinion and expression.
He stressed the positions of human rights organisations rejecting the violations of the siege and the recent movements of these organisations by condemning the ban on pilgrims from citizens and residents of Qatar from carrying out the Haj pilgrimage by setting procedural obstacles and spreading the discourse of hatred and incitement against them in the official media of siege countries.
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