US warns of underwater mines planted by Houthis

The US Office of Naval Intelligence warned commercial ships that sea mines have been planted by Yemen’s Houthi and militias allied to former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh in the Strait of Bab Al-Mandab.

The office said, in a report: “The attacks on ships in the strait, especially commercial ones, stimulate other effective bodies to intervene.” It stressed that the closure of such a waterway would lead to substantial increases in energy costs and global oil prices.

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The Strait of Bab Al-Mandab, whose width amounts to 25 kilometres, acquires a great importance for global navigation through which commercial ships move from the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea, then to the Suez Canal and Mediterranean Sea.