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Saudi Arabia suspends oil shipments via Bab el-Mandeb Strait
Saudi Arabia has temporarily suspended oil shipments via the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a key shipping lane at the southern tip of the Red Sea, after a large oil tanker was attacked by a missile fired by Houthis rebels last Thursday.
The Arsan oil tanker, from the Saudi shipping group Bahri, was carrying two million barrels of oil to Egypt. As it passed near the port of Hodeida it was attacked by a ground-to-sea missile fired from Yemen. Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for the attack.
Khalid Al Falih, Saudi Arabia’s energy minister, announced that shipping through the Red Sea would halt until it was considered safe for marine traffic.
The Gulf Cooperation Council’s Secretary-General, Dr Abdullatif bin Rashed Al Zayani, condemned the “heinous” Houthi attacks, saying the Iran-backed rebels pose a great threat to “regional security and peace”. He called on the UN Security Council to stop jeopardising the freedom of navigation in Bab el-Mandeb, a flagrant violation of international law.
The strait is one of the world’s busiest shipping routes with an estimated 4.8 million barrels of crude oil and other petroleum products passing through the Strait every day, according to the US Energy Information Administration. The narrow channel on the southern entrance to the Red Sea has become an increasing focus of Iranian-backed Houthi attacks during the three-year conflict in Yemen.
Writing in Haaretz, Amos Harel argued that the mysterious attack would heat up tensions between the US and Iran and the US even fears Iranian-led attacks on US troops in Iraq.
US President Donald Trump told the Iranian President to “never, ever threaten the United States again,” warning of unprecedented “consequences” in a tweet last week.
In response, the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Quds Force Qassem Soleimani said: “The Red Sea which was secure is no longer secure with the American presence. As a soldier, it is my duty to respond to Trump’s threats… if he wants to use the language of threat… he should talk to me, not to the [Iranian] President.”