A recent series of attacks on navy vessels and merchant tankers in a narrow strait off Yemen is raising concerns over the security of commercial oil and gas shipping in the crucial Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the waterway of global trade between the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean and the Suez Canal; it also links the Red Sea with the Gulf of Arden. Yemen has been the site of a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran whilst at the same time the Bab al-Mandeb Strait has seen oil trade steadily growing in recent years. The attack comes as tensions are rising between Qatar and its neighbours following Qatar’s support for Islamist groups such as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) which have taken advantage of the chaos to
A recent series of attacks on navy vessels and merchant tankers in a narrow strait off Yemen is raising concerns over the security of commercial oil and gas shipping in the crucial Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the waterway of global trade between the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean and the Suez Canal; it also links the Red Sea with the Gulf of Arden. Yemen has been the site of a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran whilst at the same time the Bab al-Mandeb Strait has seen oil trade steadily growing in recent years. Trade in crude oil and petroleum products at the Bab al-Mandeb Strait surged to nearly 4.7 million barrels per day in 2014, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).