Blasts heard in Saudi after strike on Aramco area

RIYADH: Powerful explosions rattled the Saudi capital on Wednesday, hours after an Ansar Allah strike hit a building in the area housing energy giant Aramco's operations centre, in a fresh escalation of the war between the kingdom and the Yemeni group. Regional powerhouse Saudi Arabia unleashed salvos against the Ansar Allah stronghold in the Yemeni capital Sanaa, while the group fired back at sites across the kingdom, which is the world's top crude oil exporter.
Most strikes on Saudi Arabia have targeted infrastructure on the outskirts of the capital, but the barrages appear to be getting closer to the city centre. On Wednesday, the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Ansar Allah said it had intercepted a missile fired by the group towards Riyadh. In the city's downtown, residents have been seen parking their cars to stop and look up at the sky, a journalist said.
On Tuesday night, the white plumes of air defence missiles could be seen streaking across the sky, followed by explosions. While walking down a major avenue, a witness said that he 'saw a projectile cutting across the sky' above a mall, saying it left 'a yellowish trail of light followed by a trail of smoke. Then, we heard an explosion'. 'People were calm; no one was speaking. We were scared and all looking up at the sky,' he added, requesting anonymity.
More blasts were heard on Wednesday, journalists in Riyadh reported, as messages were received on phones warning of an 'aerial threat' and urging people to take shelter. The alert was lifted a few minutes later. A Saudi energy ministry official said a building belonging to Aramco in Dhahran was struck on Tuesday, resulting in a 'limited fire' but 'no casualties or fatalities'. Dhahran is home to Aramco's headquarters, a vast complex comprising several buildings and residential compounds.
In Riyadh, the civil defence agency said four people — two women, a man and a child — were wounded by debris from two intercepted Ansar Allah cruise missiles and that 15 homes were damaged. The Saudi-led coalition meanwhile struck oil sites across western Yemen, with spokesman Turki al Malki saying the attacks targeted facilities used to supply the Ansar Allah effort to 'threaten the kingdom, Yemen, the southern Red Sea and waterways'.
A correspondent in Sanaa reported an explosion, while a breaking news alert on the Al Masirah TV channel said 'Saudi aggression' targeted an oil firm. The coalition has supported Yemen's government militarily against the Ansar Allah since 2015 in a long-running civil war that has created a humanitarian crisis. Many civilians in the Ansar Allah-controlled Yemeni capital, fearing shortages, have rushed to queue in front of fuel stations, a journalist said.
The escalation in violence follows a strike on Riyadh's international airport on Saturday that left 13 people dead and operations suspended in the worst attack on the kingdom since 2015. The Saudi cabinet vowed in a meeting led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that it 'will not allow its security or freedom of navigation in the Red Sea and Bab Al Mandab Strait to be threatened'.
Many countries have issued travel warnings to their citizens in Saudi Arabia, with France telling its nationals on Tuesday to avoid Riyadh, Jeddah and Dammam airports. Traffic in perennially gridlocked Riyadh was noticeably lighter this week as remote learning for all schools and work-from-home orders for some companies took effect, according to journalists. — AFP