Three people killed in Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia airports, officials say

Three people killed in Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia airports, officials say

Three people were killed in attacks on airports in Saudi Arabia over two days, authorities said, as a surge in fighting spread across the Yemen border into the kingdom.

Two people died and 28 were injured in an attack on Abha International Airport, Saudi Arabia's General Authority of Civil Aviation (Gaca) said in a statement on Wednesday.

In another incident, one person was killed and eight were injured in an attack on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, it added.

The attacks, which the Houthis have claimed responsibility for, signal an escalation in the renewed war between the Saudi-backed government forces and the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.

According to Gaca, the two airports were attacked on 6 and 7 October, though it did not say which airport was struck on which date.

Gaca said two women, one Moroccan and one Algerian, were killed in the Abha airport attack near the Yemen border.

It added that a male resident of Sudanese nationality was killed at King Khalid airport.

The country's civil aviation authority did not identify who carried out the attacks, but Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said its armed forces had struck both Saudi airports with ballistic missiles and drones.

The Houthi military spokesperson also said the Houthis attacked Aden's International Airport in Yemen on Wednesday. The airport is a key international gateway for parts of Yemen outside Houthi control and has repeatedly been targeted when fighting breaks out in the country.

Saree said the two attacks on Saudi Arabia's airports were in "response to the Saudi aggression against our country" which saw "60 airstrikes and missile attacks in the past 24 hours".

The civil war in Yemen has intensified in recent weeks after the Houthis, who control most of the country's north-west, seized strategically important stretches of the Red Sea coast in a swift offensive.

That included the port of Mokha on the Bab al-Mandab Strait, the narrowest point of the Red Sea and a chokepoint for global shipping.

But Yemeni pro-government forces backed by Saudi Arabia have since said they had "secured" the Bab al-Mandab Strait at the southern end of the Red Sea.

They also declared an all out war in an effort to take all territory held by the Houthis.

In a statement issued late on Wednesday, the official spokesperson for the Saudi-led coalition said the Houthis' attacks on Saudi Arabia's airports "will not go unpunished".

The spokesperson said the Saudi coalition had targeted more than 80 Houthi military sites across "governorates of Saada, Al Hudaydah, Al Jawf and Ma'rib".

The Saudi-led coalition was formed in 2015 after Arab countries joined forces to stop the Houthis taking over Yemen from the country's internationally recognised government.

A temporary ceasefire was brokered in 2022 after years of air strikes and ground fighting led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, triggering one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has condemned "the continued Houthi cross-border attacks" on Saudi Arabia and said he was "deeply concerned by the sharp escalation in fighting".

Hundreds of people have reportedly been killed on both sides since the latest Houthis' advance.

The UN said on Wednesday more than 200,000 people have been displaced by the escalation.