DURING the last week, the brutal Saudi Arabian dictatorship has slaughtered 42 innocent Yemeni school children with a missile and tortured, drugged and dismembered the body of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

This is the same Saudi government that Labour MP for Chester-le-Street, Kevan Jones, defended selling weapons to in a House of Commons speech in 2016 (Echo, Jan 26, 2016).

He argued that if Britain didn’t supply the Saudis with weapons then someone else would. Following the logic of Mr Jones then Britain should also supply the Saudis with torture equipment and butchering knives in case they want to chop a few more dissidents up.

Mr Jones has been a harsh critic of the foreign policy of Jeremy Corbyn who throughout his life has been on the side of the oppressed, including anti-apartheid protesters in South Africa or Palestinian victims of Israeli violence.

Mr Jones seems to be on the side of the most barbarian regime in the entire world.

John Gilmore, Bishop Auckland