EU condemns Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and ties Yemen’s stability to Red Sea security
Yemen Herald News 
BRUSSELS, Belgium — The European Union condemned the latest Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and said peace in Yemen is essential to the security of the Gulf and the Red Sea.
The statement was issued on 8 September by the spokesperson for the European External Action Service.
It said the attacks targeted civilian and economic infrastructure in the south of the kingdom and injured 73 civilians, including women and children.
“The targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure is unacceptable,” the statement said.
The bloc expressed full solidarity with Saudi Arabia and wished the injured a full and speedy recovery.
The attacks “constitute a dangerous escalation, violate international law, undermine regional security and stability and risk further jeopardising efforts towards a peaceful resolution of the conflict in Yemen,” it said.
The EU called on the Houthis to end all attacks inside and outside Yemen immediately, including attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea.
It asked the group to comply with UN Security Council resolutions 2722 of 2024 and 2826 of 2026.
Resolution 2722 demanded that the Houthis stop attacks on merchant vessels and release the car carrier Galaxy Leader and its crew.
The bloc said it remains committed to supporting the people of Yemen and to working with the United Nations, regional partners and the international community towards de-escalation.
It called for a comprehensive, inclusive and sustainable peace.
The attacks the statement refers to hit areas including Abha, Najran, Jizan and Khamis Mushait on 8 September.
Operations at several energy facilities were disrupted, and Saudi authorities said fires broke out at energy sites.
The Houthis said the attacks were retaliation for Saudi military operations in Yemen.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that day that the Houthis were, in many ways, agents and proxies of Iran.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called the strikes on Saudi territory unacceptable.
The United Kingdom said it stands with Yemen and Saudi Arabia and backs their right to defend their security and sovereignty, according to the Yemeni state news agency Saba.
The US embassy for Yemen said both countries have the right to defend themselves.
Fighting inside Yemen resumed on 3 September, when a Houthi offensive opened in Taiz governorate.
The Presidential Leadership Council answered with a counter-offensive in al-Jawf and al-Bayda.
It is the heaviest fighting in the country since the 2022 truce lapsed.
On Thursday the Houthis seized the Red Sea port city of Mocha as government forces withdrew, sources told Al Jazeera and the Reuters news agency.
Mocha overlooks Bab al-Mandab, the channel linking the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. Al Jazeera put the share of global trade passing through the strait at 10 to 12 percent.
Patrick Simonnet, head of the EU mission to Yemen, met Rashad al-Alimi in Aden on Wednesday alongside the Dutch ambassador, Janet Seeben, to discuss bilateral cooperation and regional developments, Saba reported.
Al-Alimi told them that Yemen’s defence of Bab al-Mandab was a defence of global shipping lanes and of the routes that carry life-saving supplies.
The EU has funded humanitarian work in Yemen through UN agencies, including a €3m contribution to the UN Population Fund this year.
Yemeni diplomats have spent recent days pressing European capitals on the same file.
Ambassador Aws al-Awd briefed a Spanish foreign ministry official on the Houthi threat to shipping, and Foreign Minister Afrah al-Zouba discussed Red Sea security with Spain.
Yemen’s ambassador to Prague has urged the Czech Republic and the bloc to take a harder line on the group.
Arab League permanent delegates adopted a resolution backing Yemen’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The European Commission signed a cooperation arrangement in February with the Saudi Development and Reconstruction Program for Yemen, covering joint work on services and infrastructure.
EU foreign ministers adopted conclusions on Yemen calling for renewed momentum behind peace efforts.
Hans Grundberg, the UN special envoy for Yemen, said this week that the attacks risked widening the war.
An AFP tally put the death toll from fighting in southwest Yemen above 300 by 8 September.
The International Organization for Migration has recorded 30,378 people displaced inside Yemen this year.
The UN Population Fund said its emergency teams had reached 8,365 newly displaced people in Taiz governorate.
Yemen’s Executive Unit for internally displaced people counted 2,183 families displaced in Taiz and Hodeidah.
Pakistan has urged Iran to restrain the group, and said a defence pact it finalised last month with Saudi Arabia and Turkiye could be activated if attacks on Saudi territory persist.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in its March 2026 plan that more than 22 million people in Yemen need aid, and that 18.3 million are acutely food insecure.
The plan records 5.2 million internally displaced people and more than 2.2 million children under five who are acutely malnourished, 516,157 of them severely.
OCHA sought $2.16bn this year to reach 12 million people.
The bloc runs Operation Atalanta in the region, a naval mission whose original mandate covers counter-piracy off Somalia.
A separate EU naval mission, Aspides, was set up in 2024 to escort merchant vessels through the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
The EEAS statement did not announce any new measure against the group.
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