According to Britain, no further attacks on Yemen are currently planned.
According to Yemen’s Houthi rebels, five of its fighters were killed and six were injured in strikes carried out by the United States and Britain on the night before Friday.
The representative of Yemen’s Houthi rebels, brigadier general, told about it Yahya Saree in his video message. Claims about the dead and injured could not be independently confirmed.
– The American and British enemies are fully responsible for this criminal attack on the Yemeni people. This will not go unpunished, Saree says in the video.
According to him, the United States and Britain carried out a total of 73 strikes on Houthi-held areas in Yemen.
The United States says it has carried out 60 strikes on 16 different targets, which it says were Houthi command centers, weapons depots and other military targets. According to the United States, it is prepared for the Houthis to respond with countermeasures.
Britain, on the other hand, carried out attacks on two different targets in Yemen, said the deputy defense minister James Heappey public broadcasting company the BBC in the interview.
Heappey described the nighttime attacks as “limited, proportionate and necessary”. According to him, no more attacks against Yemen’s Houthis are currently planned. He praised the British armed forces for the successful implementation of the risky operation.
– We should be very proud of what we did last night, Heappey said.
According to him, the Houthis cannot be allowed to advance their political goals by extorting international trade and cargo.
Houthi rebels say they are attacking ships to support Palestinians in Gaza, where Israel has been waging a war that has claimed the lives of thousands of civilians since a terrorist attack by Hamas in October. Hamas, on the other hand, says it condemns the US and British strikes against the Houthis.
The West supports the attacks, Russia and Iran condemn
The US and British strikes have received support from Western countries, although there are fears that they will lead to an expansion of the war in the Middle East.
A total of ten countries – Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea, the UK and the US – have signed the joint statementin which they advocate strikes against Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
In addition, the French Foreign Ministry says in its own statement that Yemen’s Houthi rebels are responsible for the escalation in the Red Sea.
– Due to repeated attacks, the Houthis bear a very serious responsibility for the escalation of the conflict in the region, the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement, according to the news agency Reuters.
Russia and Iran have condemned the attacks by the United States and Britain. Spokesman of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova wrote on the messaging service Telegram that the attacks violate international law and are aimed at escalating the situation.
Iran, which supports the Houthis, condemned the attacks as arbitrary and against international law. The attacks were also condemned by Hezbollah, an extremist movement based in Lebanon and supported by Iran.
Yemen’s neighboring country, Saudi Arabia, which supports the Yemeni government in the ongoing civil war against the Houthis, urged to avoid escalation. According to it, stability and safety in the Red Sea must be secured, and cargo ships must be allowed to pass freely.
Spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs Mao Ning said China was concerned about rising tensions in the Red Sea and called on the parties to act with restraint to prevent the conflict from escalating.
Sources: Reuters, AP, AFP, STT