A day after the two consecutive deadly attacks on the international airport in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia intercepted and destroyed two ballistic missiles launched by the Iran-aligned Houthi group in Yemen as the Saudi-Houthi standoff escalates and threatens to spill over into further attacks on energy infrastructure.
“Two ballistic missiles launched by the terrorist Houthi militia toward Khamis Mushait were intercepted and destroyed,” the Saudi Press Agency quoted Major General Turki Al-Malki, official Spokesperson of the Coalition to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen, as saying early on Tuesday.
The fresh attempts at attacks on Saudi cities, including at the southwest city of Khamis Mushait close to the Yemeni border, signal that the conflict between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia is escalating.
A Saudi-led force is fighting the Houthis to regain control of most of Yemen’s coast that lies on the Red Sea and the critical Bab el-Mandeb Strait, through which Saudi Arabia’s oil exports from the Yanbu port to Asia typically pass.
The Houthis pledged in July to disrupt Saudi shipments while allowing other traffic through Bab el-Mandeb.
The Houthi threats have forced Saudi Arabia to ship crude oil from Egypt’s Mediterranean ports to bypass the strait in the southern Red Sea. But this route, from the Mediterranean and the southern tip of Africa via the Cape of Good Hope, adds about a month to a tanker’s voyage from Yanbu to East Asia.
Early on Tuesday in Asian trade, oil prices fell by 1%, with Brent retreating to $105 per barrel from above $106 a barrel reached on Monday, as Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, sought to reassure markets yesterday that the Kingdom’s energy supply remains resilient and that Riyadh is the “capital of energy security.”
Since the start of the week, the oil market has been swinging between fears of wider Middle East escalation and hopes that a Russia-Ukraine energy ceasefire could ease soaring fuel prices.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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