The Saudi-Emirati coalition announced on Wednesday that it had thwarted an attack targeting an oil tanker in the Arabian Sea, off the eastern coast of Yemen, without mentioning the party responsible for the attack.
The Saudi News Agency quoted Colonel Turki al-Maliki, a spokesman for the coalition forces, as saying that they were able to "thwart and foil an imminent terrorist act, which was targeting one of the oil tankers in the Arabian Sea, and a distance of ninety nautical miles southeast of the Yemeni port of Active (which belongs to the province of Mahrah bordering the Sultanate of Oman) ".
Al-Maliki said that "the attempt took place on Tuesday, while the oil tanker was sailing towards the Gulf of Aden, and the attempt of four boats to attack the ship and detonate it with an unmanned boat, which is controlled from a distance."
He considered that "the marine threat to global energy security, the means of marine transportation and the global trade of ships ... has become a strategic threat to global security."
Al-Maliki stressed that he will continue to "apply the necessary measures and measures to neutralize and destroy any maritime threat in the area of the coalition's maritime operations."
He called on international partners to "unite and join forces to neutralize these threats to global security."
The statement did not accuse any party of being behind the operation, nor did any party claim responsibility for it.
In the past, the coalition had accused the Houthi group of attacking ships off the coast of Yemen with unmanned booby-trapped boats.