Houthi naval mines in the Red Sea serious threaten for the international trade routes

The Arab Coalition has removed 157 naval mines
placed in the south of the Red Sea by Iran-backed Houthis on Saturday.
The Coalition said that 157 naval mines that have
been randomly deployed by the Iran-backed Houthis, the mines have been
discovered and removed.
The Coalition added that the Houthi militia
continues to threaten maritime navigation and global trade in the Bab Al-Mandab
strait and the southern Red Sea.
Earlier this week the Arab Coalition successfully
intercepted and destroyed two explosive-laden boats in the Red Sea, launched by
Iran-backed-Houthi militia in Yemen, the Coalition spokesman Col. Turki Al-Maliki
said on Wednesday.
The spokesman said the boats were launched from
Hodeidah Governorate, which the Houthi militias use "as a base to launch
ballistic missiles, drones, booby-trapped remote-operated boats, as well as the
random deployment of sea mines in flagrant violation of international
humanitarian law and a violation of the provisions of the Stockholm cease-fire
agreement in Hodeidah.
A major environmental, humanitarian and economic
disaster lies in wait in the Red Sea - and there's only a tiny window of
opportunity to prevent it.
An internationalised civil war, food insecurity,
malnutrition, extreme poverty, climate change, Covid-19, and other deadly
diseases have left Yemen coping with numerous humanitarian crises and
emergencies for years. Now, there is a new disaster waiting to happen.
Described as a “floating bomb”, the 1,188-foot FSO
SAFER has approximately 1.14 million barrels of crude oil that risk spilling.
To provide some perspective, that is four times as much oil as the Exxon Valdez
tanker spilled in Alaska’s Prince William Sound region back in 1989. That
disaster from 31 years ago, which resulted in over 1,300 miles of shoreline
being damaged, continues causing ecological harm to this day.
According to the United Nations Environment
Program’s executive director, the 45-year-old rusting vessel sinking or
exploding would lead to decades of ecological destruction. This scenario would
threaten 1,200 species of fish, 300 species of coral reefs, as well as the
biodiversity of 115 islands. Because the oil is light weight, much of it would
spread far quicker across the water than heavy oil would. The cost of the
clean-up would be in the billions.
Such an environmental disaster would result in the
Red Sea’s ports and shipping lanes closing. For the millions of Yemenis who
depend on international aid, which can only be delivered via Yemeni ports, such
a catastrophe could produce unimaginably disastrous consequences.
The realities of Yemen’s war between Houthis on one
side and forces loyal to the Saudi-backed government of President Abdrabbuh
Mansur Hadi and the Riyadh-led Arab coalition on the other make this process
dangerous. The continuation of this war makes it increasingly risky for a
salvage team to do the job which is necessary to prevent such an oil spill.
After all, this vessel is situated in an extremely militarised body of water.
Various reports allege that the Houthis are
exploiting the “floating bomb” for political purposes, using the vessel as a
“bargaining chip” to gain control of the oil on board (worth roughly USD 40
million—down from USD 80 million before oil prices collapsed earlier this year)
to finance salaries of employees within the de facto Houthi proto-state. The
Hadi government’s position is that the oil proceeds should be invested in
projects across Yemen to help the country better cope with humanitarian
emergencies.