Gulf of Aden: Two killed in Houthi missile attack on cargo ship ⁰

Two crew members have been killed in a Houthi missile strike on a cargo ship off southern Yemen, US officials say – the first deaths the group’s attacks on merchant vessels have caused.

The Barbados-flagged True Confidence had been abandoned and was drifting with a fire on board, managers said.

It was hit in the Gulf of Aden at about 09:30 GMT, they added.

The Houthis say their attacks are to support the Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

In a statement, the Iran-backed group said the True Confidence’s crew had ignored warnings from Houthi naval forces.

The British embassy in Yemen said the sailors’ deaths were the “sad but inevitable consequence of the Houthis recklessly firing missiles at international shipping” and insisted the attacks had to stop.

Six crew members were also injured, a US official told the BBC’s US partner CBS.

The attack happened about 50 nautical miles (93km) south-west of the Yemeni city of Aden, a spokesman for the ship’s owners and managers said in a statement.

Following the attack, Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV reported on Wednesday evening that two US-led air strikes had targeted the international airport in the Houthi-controlled Red Sea port city of Hudaydah.

Source: BBC