Saudi Arabia reports Houthi attacks on power plants

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Yemeni Houthi rebels carried out a round of drone and missile attacks on Saudi Arabia on Sunday morning targeting a liquefied natural gas plant, a water desalination plant, an oil installation and a power plant, according to Saudi state media.

The attacks did not cause casualties, according to the Saudi-led military coalition fighting in Yemen, although they damaged civilian vehicles and homes in the area.

The offensive was a further escalation in the Houthi cross-border attacks against Saudi Arabia. Peace talks remain stalled, and the conflict that has swept through much of Yemen since 2015 continues.

Yehia Sarie, a spokesman for the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, said the group had embarked on “a large and large military operation in the heart of Saudi Arabia,” without giving any further details.

The military coalition said it had thwarted an attack on a liquefied gas plant in a petrochemical complex in the Red Sea port of Yanbu, managed by Saudi Arabian Oil Co., better known as Aramco. At first it was not clear whether the plant had suffered any damage.

The extent of the damage was unclear. The official Saudi news agency shared several images of fire trucks throwing water with hoses over large flames, as well as wrecked cars and craters on the ground, allegedly caused by drone and missile attacks.

The Gulf Cooperation Council, an institution based in Saudi Arabia, invited the two sides to meet in Riyadh to negotiate an end to the fighting, an offer rejected outright by the Houthis, who demanded that the talks be held in a “neutral” country.

Negotiations have stalled since the Houthis attempted to seize the oil town of Marib, one of the last strongholds of the Saudi-backed Yemeni government in the north of the country.

Yemen's brutal war broke out in 2015 after the Houthis, a Shiite group backed by Iran, seized the country's capital, Sana'a, and much of the north. Saudi Arabia, which looked suspiciously at the Iranian presence on its border, launched a devastating bombing campaign with other Arab countries to expel the Houthis and restore the government with international recognition.

The conflict has reached a violent stalemate in which Saudi Arabia and its allies fail to decide the war in their favor. Saudi coalition airstrikes have decimated infrastructure and hit civilian targets in Yemen such as hospitals and wedding receptions, prompting widespread international criticism.

The war has created one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world. A recent United Nations report estimated that hundreds of thousands of people have died and millions have been displaced as a result of the conflict.