Cairo, Sep 20: A senior official with the Iran-backed Houthi rebels is warning countries against joining Saudi Arabia in Yemen’s revived civil war, telling The Associated Press on Sunday that his group has assured the Trump administration that it won’t attack US vessels in the Red Sea.

Mohamed al-Bukhaiti, a member of the Houthis’ political bureau, said Washington reached out to the rebels after their rapid advance down Yemen’s western coast to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait earlier this month.

“We confirmed that we are not targeting the United States, or any other nation, in the strait, with the sole exception of the Saudi enemy,” he told the AP in a Zoom interview from the rebel-held Yemeni capital, Sanaa. “That remains the case.”

US President Donald Trump last weekend said his administration has “had discussions” with the Houthis, but did not say when. “The Houthis called us, and they don’t want to fight with us,” he said. “They would much prefer not having us involved, and they’re letting most ships go through.”

The AP later reported that Oman hosted a meeting between US and Houthi representatives last weekend, citing a Houthi official and another individual familiar with the talks. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

However, al-Bukhaiti only confirmed indirect contacts with US officials through longtime mediator Oman, which brokered a 2025 ceasefire between the Houthis and the Trump administration. That ended a week-long US bombing campaign against the rebels in return for them ceasing attacks on US vessels in the Red Sea.

“The goal of our military operations is not to close the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, but rather to ensure freedom of navigation through it for everyone, including Yemen,” he said.

The Houthis claim they can fight a war on multiple fronts

Al-Bukhaiti said the rebels have the capacity to fight a war on multiple fronts “should any nation become implicated in the aggression against Yemen alongside Saudi Arabia.”

“Today, Yemen is capable of waging battle — not merely an internal conflict, but an international one as well,” he said.

He said the Houthi attacks against neighbouring Saudi Arabia will persist until Riyadh ends its decade-long blockade on rebel-held areas in Yemen and allows vessels to reach Houthi-controlled ports on the Red Sea. Then they will be ready to negotiate, he said.

Al-Bukhaiti blamed Saudi Arabia for the latest escalation of violence in Yemen, which he said erupted after an airstrike blamed on the Saudi-led coalition fighting the rebels hit the Sanaa international airport. The strike prevented an Iranian flight carrying a Houthi delegation from landing. The flight was a Houthi attempt to challenge the coalition’s air and naval blockade.

The Houthis responded with missile and drone strikes on Saudi Arabia, including one that targeted Riyadh on Saturday before being intercepted. Saudi officials said debris from a Houthi drone also killed one civilian and injured others.

The Houthis also declared a blockade on Saudi shipping in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and the Red Sea, attacking Saudi-linked vessels and oil facilities inside the kingdom, the world’s top oil exporter.

The Saudis and their allies have long struggled to contain the Houthis, and may be tempted to seek a diplomatic solution to halt attacks. That might ultimately require US concessions to Iran, the only country with leverage over the Houthis. But Washington’s negotiations with Tehran over their own war fell apart weeks ago.

The US, which bombed the Houthis under the Biden and Trump administrations, has shown no interest in getting involved militarily this time around.

The rebels believe power has shifted in their favour

The rebels’ advance inside Yemen seized the crucial port city of Mokha and key Red Sea islands that allow them to better monitor shipping traffic through the Bab el-Mandeb, through which some 12 per cent of world trade normally passes.

The Saudi-backed Yemeni government forces, long divided into factions, withdrew but have vowed to regroup.

The escalation ended a 2022 ceasefire that largely ended fighting in Yemen’s civil war, which started when the Houthis swept in from their mountainous heartland and seized much of northern and central Yemen, including Sanaa, 12 years ago.

The Saudi-led coalition entered the war the following year on behalf of the internationally recognised government. The civil war killed at least 150,000 people, according to UN estimates, and pushed the country to the brink of famine.

Now, with Houthis in control of Yemen’s western coast overlooking the Red Sea shipping corridor, “the balance of power has shifted in favour of the Sanaa government,” al-Bukhaiti said, referring to the rebels’ de facto authorities there.

“Ultimately, (Saudi Arabia) lost its most critical card: the west coast,” he said.

Moscow, Sep 21: Early results from Russia’s first wartime parliamentary election, released by the country’s election commission early Monday, showed the main Kremlin party dominating the vote.

The tightly controlled balloting was virtually devoid of opposition to President Vladimir Putin’s policies and all but certain to cement the Kremlin’s dominance.

With some 58% of the precincts counted, United Russia had nearly 58% of the vote for the 225 deputies apportioned by party lists, according to the Central Election Commission.

Another 225 lawmakers will be chosen in single-seat races, and United Russia also was poised to win most of those.

The balloting included residents of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow illegally annexed after the war began, but still doesn’t fully control, as well as those in Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula that was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, in what Kyiv denounced as illegal and the European Union described as a “blatant violation of international law”.

Success in the polls by United Russia, backed by President Vladimir Putin, will help the Kremlin keep its tight grip on power.

The vote, which saw most opposition barred from running, took place against the backdrop of the harshest political crackdowns and freedom of speech in Russia since Soviet times.

The early results showed four other parties that almost always vote for Kremlin initiatives returning to the State Duma, the lower chamber of parliament.

Saudi Arabia has confirmed that Yemen’s Houthi rebels tried to attack its capital with a ballistic missile.

The statement late Saturday by the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis came long after the morning attempt, which the coalition said was intercepted.

It was the first attack targeting Riyadh since the escalation in fighting between the Iran-backed Houthis and Yemeni government forces backed by the Saudis.

The statement also said the Houthis tried to attack civilian infrastructure in the Red Sea port city of Yanbu and in Taif, Baysh and Farasan but they were thwarted, giving no further details.

The Houthis earlier claimed, without providing evidence, they had targeted “sensitive sites” in Riyadh and facilities of Saudi oil giant Aramco in Yanbu, causing “massive fires”.

Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, did not respond to a request for comment.

The growing conflict near another important global shipping corridor has brought new pressures for markets.