Yemen’s Houthis will continue retaliatory strikes against Saudi airports and oil facilities as long as Riyadh continues its military operations in Yemen, the Houthi administration’s acting foreign minister, Abdulwahid Abu Ras, has told RT. He said the fighting could end if Saudi Arabia lifted its blockade and withdrew its forces from Yemeni territory. Recent Houthi-claimed strikes on Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport have killed at least 14 people and injured more than 300 over the weekend. On Tuesday, the Saudi-led coalition struck a fuel depot near Yemen’s capital, Sanaa. The minister described the group’s approach as “an eye for an eye,” saying Houthi forces were targeting Saudi oil facilities, infrastructure, and military positions in retaliation.
“Siege for siege, airport for airport, ports for ports, and escalation for escalation,” Abu Ras told RT India Managing Editor Ashok Bagriya in an exclusive interview. The renewed confrontation began in July when strikes on Sanaa airport were followed by Houthi missile attacks on Saudi Arabia, breaking years of relative calm following a United Nations-brokered truce in 2022. United Nations envoy Hans Grundberg warned last week that Yemen had returned to full-scale war. “Our red lines are that the blockade on Yemen, our airports, and our ports must not continue,” Abu Ras said. He also demanded access to the country’s oil and gas resources.
He said the Houthi administration remains prepared for direct negotiations with Riyadh despite Saudi Arabia allegedly failing to implement earlier humanitarian agreements. “We invite the Saudi regime to sit at the negotiation table to implement what was agreed upon,” Abu Ras said, calling for humanitarian facilities to be kept out of the fighting. Abu Ras, however, ruled out Sanaa imposing tolls or fees on commercial vessels using the strategic Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which its forces now control after recent advances along the coast. “This is out of the question… Sanaa is keen to keep the shipping lane and commercial traffic in Bab el-Mandeb completely normal in every sense of the word.”
The minister also sought to separate the fighting in his country from the conflict between the US and Iran, the Houthis’ main backer. “The Yemeni position is a declared position regarding its internal cause, its national cause… which have nothing to do with any external agenda.”
“Whether the brothers in the Islamic Republic of Iran reach solutions with the American side or not, this is a completely separate issue,” he said.
Abu Ras accused the UK of adopting hostile positions in the UN Security Council, providing cover for Saudi actions, and legitimizing them in international forums.“Such interventions further complicate the conflict and drag the region towards a potentially larger conflict, which could lead to repercussions and consequences that affect everyone,” the minister warned.
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