Yemen's Houthi group said on Monday it had carried out six attacks against oil, aviation and military targets in Saudi Arabia over the past 48 hours, as security concerns prompted the kingdom to postpone its flagship investment conference originally scheduled for later this month.
Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a statement that the first attack targeted facilities of Saudi oil giant Aramco in the Red Sea city of Yanbu, claiming the strikes hit the targets and caused fires.
The second targeted the Shaybah oil field in eastern Saudi Arabia and caused fires, he said.
Other attacks targeted King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, Abha International Airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia, radar installations at Jabal Al-Hisn and Jabal Al-Rahmah, King Khalid Air Base near Khamis Mushait, a Saudi naval task force camp, and a radar installation in the southern Najran region, he said.
The six operations were in response to more than 200 Saudi air and missile strikes on Sanaa and other Houthi-held areas of Yemen over the past 48 hours, he said.
There was no immediate comment on these operations from Saudi Arabia or the Saudi-led coalition.
Deadly strikes by Houthis in recent weeks have dealt a blow to the kingdom, forcing the airport to close until further notice and a slate of events to be postponed or canceled, including its flagship investment forum dubbed "Davos in the Desert".
The kingdom announced on Monday the postponement of the 10th edition of the Future Investment Initiative conference, its flagship event originally scheduled for Oct 26-29 in Riyadh, to 2027.
For nearly a decade, the conference has been a showcase for Saudi Arabia's push to attract global investors, business leaders and heads of state — and to showcase its economic vision.
Domestic airlines have scrambled to find alternative routes for the capital's 7 million residents, with recent targeted advertisements highlighting flights from Al-Qassim International Airport three hours from Riyadh.
Government agencies in the Saudi capital have told employees to work from home starting from Monday, one worker and two consultants told AFP. The 99-story Kingdom Centre skyscraper in downtown Riyadh housing the regional office of the International Monetary Fund has also asked its employees to work from home.
Attacks condemned
The latest disruptions came amid continued cross-border attacks between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia, alongside heavy fighting between the group and Saudi-backed Yemeni government forces. A Houthi missile attack on a government military base in Yemen's southeastern oil-rich province of Shabwa earlier on Monday killed 73 people, with more than 200 others injured, local officials said.
On Monday, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan bin Abdullah Al Saud discussed regional developments in separate phone calls with his Turkish and United Arab Emirates counterparts, during which they condemned the continued attacks by the Houthi group, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
Britain announced on Tuesday that it is expanding military support for Saudi Arabia against the Houthis to include "defensive" air patrols by Royal Air Force jets.
Defense Secretary Wes Streeting said Royal Air Force Typhoon jets will help to "protect Saudi cities, civilian populations and critical national infrastructure from Houthi attack".
Turkiye has sent the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement, a defense pact between Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye, to parliament to be ratified, three parliamentary sources said on Tuesday.
Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmus, who is in Kyrgyzstan at the moment, will submit the agreement to parliament's foreign affairs commission after returning to Turkiye, two of the sources said.
Meanwhile, Egypt's parliament postponed a vote on authorizing military support for Saudi Arabia until Oct 26, after several lawmakers reportedly requested to speak.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi on Saturday asked parliament to authorize Egypt to defend Saudi Arabia if requested, while stressing he meant "defense", not war.
Yemen has been mired in conflict since late 2014, when the Houthis seized the capital Sanaa and much of the country's north. A Saudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 in support of the internationally recognized Yemeni government.
As Houthis intensified their attacks and as tensions flared up between the US and Iran over the Strait of Hormuz, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during an unannounced visit to Israel on Monday, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The officials did not provide further details about the meeting, first reported by Axios. The Pentagon declined to comment. The Israeli prime minister's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Editor：Zhou Jinmiao
