A senior Houthi official has vowed to ensure the safety of Russian and Chinese ships in the Red Sea, where an Iran-backed Yemeni militant group is targeting commercial vessels in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
Mohammed al-Bukhaiti said the waters around Yemen, which some shipping companies avoid because of the ongoing aggression, are safe as long as ships are not linked to certain countries, particularly Israel, Agence France-Presse reported. The Houthi official said:
As for all other countries, including Russia and China, their shipping in the region is not threatened. Moreover, we are ready to ensure the safe passage of their ships in the Red Sea, because free navigation plays a significant role for our country.
He added that attacks on vessels “in any way connected with Israel” would continue.
Iranian-backed militants recently claimed that US and British ships were also targeted after the two countries launched airstrikes in Yemen.
Houthis fired two anti-ship ballistic missiles at a US-owned tanker Chem Ranger late Thursday night. No information has yet been reported on injuries or casualties.
The incident occurred around 9 p.m. Yemen time (1800 GMT), US Central Command said in a statement on its website X.
Monitoring service TankerTrackers.com reported on social media that “a fairly small chemical tanker left the Red Sea port of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for Kuwait, but its AIS (automatic identification system) went offline on Tuesday before it travelled south past Yemen.”
In an interview on Friday, Bukhaiti said the blame for the attacks on the vessels lies with those vessels that ignored Houthi orders to change course. He added:
Our goal is to raise the economic costs for the Jewish state in order to stop the carnage in Gaza.
