An oil tanker burned in the Gulf of Aden after a Houthi missile attack

CNN
—

An oil tanker caught fire in the Gulf of Aden after a missile attack by Houthi militants in Yemen, in the latest incident linked to the Iran-backed group on the main shipping route.

Commodity group Trafigura, operator of the Marlin Luanda oil tanker, said Friday that the ship “was attacked by a missile in the Gulf of Aden after crossing the Red Sea,” and that “firefighting equipment is being deployed on board to extinguish and extinguish it.” Controlling the fire that broke out in a cargo tank on the right side.

Iran-backed militants claimed responsibility for the attack, saying in A statement They fired on the tanker in response to “the American-British aggression against our country.” [Yemen]”And in support of the Palestinian people.

Trafigura, which has offices in Britain, said it was monitoring the situation and that military ships in the area were on the way to “provide assistance.”

The British government has not yet commented on the attack.

A US destroyer in the Gulf of Aden is responding to a distress call from the burning tanker, a US official said.

Earlier in the day, the USS Carney, an Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer, shot down an anti-ship ballistic missile launched by the Houthis that targeted the US warship, according to US Central Command. There were no casualties as a result of the attack on the destroyer USS Carney.

The United States and the United Kingdom are carrying out strikes against it Houthi goals in Yemen After the Biden administration and its allies warned that the group would bear the consequences of its attacks in the international shipping lane.

The Houthis said they would not stop their attacks until the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza ended. Houthi leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi said in a speech that it is “a great honor and blessing to confront America directly.”

The attacks forced some of the world's largest shipping and oil companies to suspend transit through one of the world's ports The most important maritime trade routes. Instead, tankers are adding thousands of miles to international shipping routes by sailing around the continent of Africa instead of going through the Suez Canal.

CNN Previously mentioned US intelligence officials believe that Iran is carefully calibrating its response to Israel's war in Gaza, allowing and even encouraging its proxy groups to impose costs on Israeli and US interests in the region – while refraining from activities that would provoke a direct confrontation with Iran itself. .

In Yemen a year The conflict between Houthi forces and the Saudi-backed coalition have plunged the population into a devastating humanitarian crisis marked by famine, economic turmoil, and extreme poverty.

Houthi forces stormed the capital, Sanaa, in 2014, overthrowing the internationally recognized, Saudi-backed government, leading to a civil war. The conflict escalated into a wider war in 2015 when the Saudi-led coalition intervened in an attempt to defeat the Houthis.

The conflict killed up to 377,000 people, the United Nations Development Program reported in 2021. More than half of these died from indirect causes linked to the conflict, such as lack of food, water and health care.

This is a developing story and will be updated.