PARIS: A rights group filed a lawsuit against Saudi Crown Prince Mohammedbin Salman during his visit to France on Tuesday, accusing him ofcomplicity in torture and inhumane treatment in Yemen, lawyers said.

The complaint on behalf of Taha Hussein Mohamed, director of the LegalCenter for Rights and Development (LCRD), said the prince who is SaudiArabia’s defence minister was responsible attacks that hit civilians inYemen.

The case was filed in a Paris court as pressure grows on President EmmanuelMacron to curb arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates,which spearhead a coalition fighting Iran-aligned Houthi rebels who controlof most of northern Yemen and the capital Sanaa.

Speaking to reporters in Paris, Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir dismissedthe lawsuit and said the Houthis should be held accountable for the war inYemen.

The rights group, based in the Houthi-controlled Yemeni capital Sanaa, sayson its website it monitors and documents rights’ violations in Yemen.

“He ordered the first bombings on Yemeni territory on March 25, 2015,” thegroup’s lawyers, Joseph Breham and Hakim Chergui, said in the complaintseen by Reuters.

“The existence of indiscriminate shelling by the coalition armed forcesaffecting civilian populations in Yemen can be qualified as acts oftorture,” they wrote.

The lawsuit may embarrass Macron at a delicate moment in French-Saudirelations. France is the world’s third-biggest arms exporter and counts thekingdom as one of its biggest buyers.

The lawyers cited UN reports and documentation by rights groups such asHuman Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Oxfam on arbitrary detentionsand the use of illegal cluster bombs. – Agencies