Saudi Aramco, the national oil company of Saudi Arabia, shut down its Jazan oil refinery on Tuesday after a Houthi missile and drone attack damaged key facilities at the site.
PREMIUM TIMES previously reported that even though the US and Iran stopped exchanging strikes on Friday night, a new war front has emerged between Houthis in Yemen and Saudi Arabia.
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This paper also reported that the Houthis fired missiles and drones at Aramco’s facilities in Jazan and Yanbu last Saturday. The group said its strikes were retaliation for Saudi attacks on Hodeida, Yemen’s port city on the Red Sea coast.
Reuters reported on Tuesday that the Houthi attack damaged the refinery’s integrated gasification combined-cycle complex and an oil storage area.
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Aramco plans to complete repairs and begin restarting operations by 15 August.
The Aramco-affiliated facilities are Saudi Arabia’s most strategically important oil facilities on the Red Sea. The country had rerouted its crude output to Yanbu via its east-west pipeline to get around Iranian attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, which began after the US and Israel launched a war on Iran in February.
The Jazan refinery can process 400,000 barrels of oil per day.
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Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia also reported intercepting drones launched from Iraq that targeted oil facilities in the Eastern Province and Riyadh on Monday.
Saudi’s Foreign Ministry, in response, said it “reserves the right to respond” to the attack, which it attributed to Iran-backed armed groups in Iraq.
However, the Iraqi government said it will investigate the alleged launch of drones from Iraqi territory
Top Iraqi security officials are also requesting intelligence and evidence from Riyadh in a bid to determine who was behind the attack.
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