Cairo: Yemen's Houthi rebels have announced they are imposing a maritime embargo against Saudi Arabia in response for a recent attack on Sanaa Airport.
Yahya Saree, a military spokesperson for the Houthis, said in a video statement on Monday that the maritime ban against Saudi Arabia will be effective immediately in what he described as an “equation of an eye for an eye.'”
His remarks come after a fiery exchange between the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen last week during which Sanaa International Airport and Abha airport in Saudi Arabia were struck, threatening a truce that has been in place since 2022.
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There were few details, but the deputy head of the Houthi media office, Nasruddin Amer, said on X that the Bab al-Mandeb strait will be closed in response to what he called Saudi Arabia's "unjust blockade on Yemenis for over 10 years.”
Bab el-Mandeb, at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, is the gateway to the Red Sea through which around 12 per cent of the world's trade usually passes. A fourth of global container trade transits through the 32-kilometre (20-mile)-wide strait to and from the Suez Canal.
The Houthis earlier demonstrated their ability to disrupt shipping there when they targeted ships for months over the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, with over 100 vessels attacked. It is unclear whether the Houthis will resume that level of attack against neighbouring Saudi Arabia.
There was no immediate response from Saudi Arabia. The kingdom already faced pressure as it uses its East-West Pipeline to the Red Sea as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz, which remains in the grip that Iran imposed shortly after the US and Israel attacked it on February 28. The Saudis have been sending millions of barrels of crude oil a day through the pipeline.
Saudi Arabia leads a coalition against the Houthis and imposed an air and sea blockade on Yemen in 2015.
The Houthis are a crucial part of Iran's so-called “Axis of Resistance,” which also includes militant groups in Lebanon, Iraq and the Palestinian territories.
The rebels have had a large stockpile of drones, but several Houthi members previously told the AP that the stockpile is running low after its attacks during the Israel-Hamas war. The Iran war has further impeded the flow of weapons, said the members, who at the time spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorised to talk to the media.
The US and Israel responded to the Houthis' earlier attacks on shipping with a punishing air campaign across Houthi-held areas in Yemen until a deal that saw the rebels stop their assaults.
Disrupting transit through the Bab al-Mandeb forces shipping firms to route vessels around the Cape of Good Hope, significantly increasing costs.
