Cairo, Dec. 20, (dpa/GNA) – Yemen’s Houthi rebels on Tuesday pledged to continue their attacks on ships in the Red Sea despite a new US-led multinational operation to secure the commercial route.
The steps announced by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Monday would not deter the rebels and their “operations in support of Gaza,” said Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, a member of the Houthi militant leadership.
The US initiative was intended to “protect Israel and militarize the sea without any justification,” he added, and whoever sought to escalate the conflict would have to “bear the consequences of their actions.”
In recent years, the Houthi rebels have repeatedly attacked ships in the Bab al-Mandab strait and in the Red Sea. After the start of the Gaza war, they declared their solidarity with the Islamist Hamas and initially attempted to attack Israel directly.
From mid-November, they began directing attacks with drones and missiles at ships with links to Israel. Ships with no links to Israel or that call at Israeli harbours also appear to be targeted, prompting several major shipping companies to suspend transports through the Red Sea to the Suez Canal.
Danish shipping giant Maersk on Tuesday joined the world’s largest container shipping company, Switzerland’s MSC, and German-based Hapag-Lloyd in announcing that it would start to reroute its vessels around Africa via the Cape of Good Hope to avoid the Red Sea.
Other industry giants are also choosing the longer route around Africa out of concern for the safety of their ships travelling between Asia and Europe.
Maersk announced late last week that it was temporarily pausing its transports through the Suez Canal, but Tuesday’s announcement of the ships being rerouted takes the crisis measure a step further.
The US security initiative, named Operation Prosperity Guardian, will be supported by numerous countries, including Britain, France, Italy, Norway, Canada, Spain, the Netherlands and Bahrain.
“This is an international challenge that demands collective action,” Austin said during his visit to the Middle East.
A UN spokesman sharply condemned the Houthi attacks on Tuesday. “It is not only impeding the freedom of navigation, which is an important part of international law,” he said in New York.
“It has a potential of creating havoc on the global trade, and we’re already seeing it. And then also, as I’ve said before, it has the potential of creating a horrendous ecological disaster should a full tanker explode in the Red Sea, which is a very delicate ecosystem.”
GNA