RIYADH – Yemen’s Iran-allied Houthis said Saudi Arabia was attacking the Yemeni capital Sanaa on Tuesday after a Saudi-led coalition warned civilians to stay away from an oil depot on the city outskirts, part of a rapidly escalating war between the sides.
The Houthis have for a week been targeting Saudi airports, including a strike on Riyadh on Saturday that killed 13 people, in retaliation for the kingdom’s backing of government forces against the Houthis in Yemen’s reignited civil war.
Houthi-run Al-Masirah television reported that the Saudi-led coalition had targeted the Yemen Petroleum Company’s Sabah central station, a fuel depot on the outskirts of Sanaa.
YPC said the facility did not currently hold any stocks of petroleum products and that targeting it did not affect oil reserves or supply chains.
However, the Houthis had earlier threatened a “harsh and painful” response to any strikes on Sanaa, with spokesperson Yahya Saree saying targets could include the Saudi Aramco headquarters in Dhahran and an oil refinery in Riyadh.
The group renewed earlier warnings it had issued to oil workers in Saudi Arabia, telling them to stay away from sites that could be potential targets.
Saturday’s ballistic missile strike on Riyadh airport was the deadliest in Saudi Arabia for a decade, with further attacks grounding flights across the country even as it hosts a major energy conference.
