JAKARTA: The Saudi Tourism Authority launched on Wednesday its first show exhibition in Indonesia to introduce the Kingdom’s cultural and adventure destinations to visitors from the world’s largest Muslim-majority country.
The tourism sector has been booming under Vision 2030, as the Kingdom positions itself as a dynamic, diverse, year-round tourism destination and market that will contribute 10 percent to the gross domestic product by 2030.
Welcomed with dates and qahwa — traditional Arabic coffee — Indonesians flocked the STA exhibition inaugurated by Saudi Hajj and Umrah Minister Tawfiq Al-Rabiah and Alhasan Aldabbagh, STA president for Asia-Pacific markets, at the Kota Kasablanka Mall in South Jakarta.
“Saudi and Indonesia are good countries that have enjoyed social and economic ties for many, many years, and we have been receiving and welcoming many Indonesian travelers who are going for Umrah and Hajj,” Aldabbagh told reporters.
“We want to attract even more Indonesians, not just to do Umrah but to explore other places … Indonesia is a special market for us because of this strong relationship.”
More than 1.5 million Indonesians visited the Kingdom in 2023, but as most of them traveled for Umrah and focused on pilgrimage sites, Saudi authorities are hoping that they will begin to also explore the country’s rich history and heritage.
Aldabbagh was expecting about 10,000 visitors daily at the Jakarta exhibition, which will run until May 5.
“We want people to learn about all the attractions that we have in Saudi … to come with their families and enjoy and discover,” he said, giving as examples Jeddah and AlUla.
Alhasan Aldabbagh, Saudi Tourism Authority president for Asia-Pacific markets, speaks to Jakarta, Indonesia, on May 1, 2024. (AN Photo)
A historical city on the eastern shore of the Red Sea, Jeddah from the 7th century has been a major port for Indian Ocean trade routes and also the gateway for Muslim pilgrims to Makkah.
Featured on the UNESCO World Heritage List, Jeddah has a distinctive architectural tradition, with influences from along the ancient trade routes.
AlUla, another UNESCO site, is an ancient desert oasis and one of the most significant cultural cradles in the Arabian Peninsula.
The ancient kingdoms flourished in the AlUla Valley between 800 and 100 B.C. and were followed by Hegra — Saudi Arabia’s first location registered on the World Heritage List — was a major city of the Nabataean civilization whose capital, Petra, was located in present-day Jordan.
The Saudi travel show in Jakarta has already drawn interest from prospective visitors, who said they are intrigued by the variety of destinations the Kingdom had to offer.
“This is good for us to gain more information because we’ve never had this before, this is rare. Usually, we’ll get information from travel agencies, but this is coming straight from the Saudi authorities,” said Yudi Prasetyo, a Jakarta resident.
Another visitor, Linda Wardani, was curious to explore the Kingdom’s ancient sites, which she has so far known only from social media channels.
“We are curious to see AlUla looking so wonderful,” she said. “We are even more curious about other destinations in Saudi Arabia because when it comes to Umrah, the destinations are commonly known, but aside from that, we’re seeing the growth of Saudi Arabia and there are other tourist sites to see.”
Halid Umar Bakadam, CEO of Dream Tour travel agency, has also observed a growing interest beyond Umrah. His company now offers extended tours, where visitors can go and see other destinations in the Kingdom.
“They are welcoming more tourists,” he said. “For the new destinations, there are quite many people showing interest.”
How lessons learned from the 2016 campaign led US officials to be more open about Iran hack
They accused Iranian hackers of targeting the presidential campaigns of both major parties as part of a broader attempt to sow discord in the American political process
Updated 17 sec ago
AP
WASHINGTON: The 2016 presidential campaign was entering its final months and seemingly all of Washington was abuzz with talk about how Russian hackers had penetrated the email accounts of Democrats, triggering the release of internal communications that seemed designed to boost Donald Trump’s campaign and hurt Hillary Clinton’s.
Yet there was a notable exception: The officials investigating the hacks were silent.
When they finally issued a statement, one month before the election, it was just three paragraphs and did little more than confirm what had been publicly suspected — that there had been a brazen Russian effort to interfere in the vote.
This year, there was another foreign hack, but the response was decidedly different. US security officials acted more swiftly to name the culprit, detailing their findings and blaming a foreign adversary — this time, Iran — just over a week after Trump’s campaign revealed the attack.
They accused Iranian hackers of targeting the presidential campaigns of both major parties as part of a broader attempt to sow discord in the American political process.
The forthright response is part of a new effort to be more transparent about threats. It was a task made easier because the circumstances weren’t as politically volatile as in 2016, when a Democratic administration was investigating Russia’s attempts to help the Republican candidate.
But it also likely reflects lessons learned from past years when officials tasked with protecting elections from foreign adversaries were criticized by some for holding onto sensitive information — and lambasted by others for wading into politics.
Suzanne Spaulding, a former official with the Department of Homeland Security, said agencies realize that releasing information can help thwart the efforts of US adversaries.
“This is certainly an example of that — getting out there quickly to say, ‘Look, this is what Iran’s trying to do. It’s an important way of building public resilience against this propaganda effort by Iran,’” said Spaulding, now a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
The Aug. 19 statement by security officials followed a Trump campaign announcement that it had been breached, reports from cybersecurity firms linking the intrusion to Iran and news articles disclosing that media organizations had been approached with apparently hacked materials.
But the officials suggested their response was independent of those developments.
The FBI, which made the Iran announcement along with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said in a statement to The Associated Press that “transparency is one of the most powerful tools we have to counteract foreign malign influence operations intended to undermine our elections and democratic institutions.”
The FBI said the government had refined its policies to ensure that information is shared as it becomes available, “so the American people can better understand this threat, recognize the tactics, and protect their vote.
A Wholesale Reorganization
A spokesperson for the ODNI also told AP that the government’s assessment arose from a new process for notifying the public about election threats.
Created following the 2020 elections, the framework sets out a process for investigating and responding to cyber threats against campaigns, election offices or the public. When a threat is deemed sufficiently serious, it is “nominated” for additional action, including a private warning to the attack’s target or a public announcement.
“The Intelligence Community has been focused on collecting and analyzing intelligence regarding foreign malign influence activities, to include those of Iran, targeting US elections,” the agency said. “For this notification, the IC had relevant intelligence that prompted a nomination.”
The bureaucratic terminology obscures what for the intelligence community has been a wholesale reorganization of how the government tracks threats against elections since 2016, when Russian hacking underscored the foreign interference threat.
“In 2016 we were completely caught off guard,” said Sen. Mark Warner, D-Virginia, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. “There were some indications, but nobody really understood the scale.”
That summer, US officials watched with alarm as Democratic emails stolen by Russian military hackers spilled out in piecemeal fashion on WikiLeaks. By the end of July, the FBI had opened an investigation into whether the Trump campaign was coordinating with Russia to tip the election. The probe ended without any finding that the two sides had criminally colluded with each other.
Inside the White House, officials debated how to inform the public of its assessment that Russia was behind the hack-and-leak. There was discussion about whether such a statement might have the unintended consequence of making voters distrustful of election results, thereby helping Russia achieve its goal of undermining faith in democracy.
Then-FBI Director James Comey wrote in his book, “A Higher Loyalty,” that he at one point proposed writing a newspaper opinion piece documenting Russia’s activities. He described the Obama administration deliberations as “extensive, thoughtful, and very slow,” culminating in the pre-election statement followed by a longer intelligence community assessment in January 2017.
“I know we did agonize over whether to say something and when to say it and that sort of thing because it appeared in the case of the Russians that they were favoring one candidate over the other,” James Clapper, the then-director of national intelligence, said in an interview.
A Bumpy Road
In 2018, Congress created CISA, the Department of Homeland Security’s cyber arm, to defend against digital attacks. Four years later the Foreign and Malign Influence Center was established within the ODNI to track foreign government efforts to sway US elections.
Bret Schafer, a senior fellow at the Alliance for Securing Democracy, a Washington-based organization that analyzes foreign disinformation, said he’s pleased that in its first election, the center doesn’t seem to have been “hobbled by some of the partisanship that we’ve seen cripple other parts of the government that tried to do this work.”
Still, there have been obstacles and controversies. Shortly after Joe Biden won the 2020 election, Trump fired the head of CISA, Christopher Krebs, for refuting his unsubstantiated claim of electoral fraud.
Also during the 2020 elections, The New York Post reported that it had obtained a hard drive from a laptop dropped off by Hunter Biden at a Delaware computer repair shop. Public confusion followed, as did claims by former intelligence officials that the emergence of the laptop bore the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign. Trump’s national intelligence director, John Ratcliffe, soon after rebutted that assessment with a statement saying there were no signs of Russian involvement.
In 2022, the work of a new office called the Disinformation Governance Board was quickly suspended after Republicans raised questions about its relationship with social media companies and concerns that it could be used to monitor or censor Americans’ online discourse.
Legal challenges over government restrictions on free speech have also complicated the government’s ability to exchange information with social media companies, though Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said in a recent address that the government has resumed sharing details with the private sector.
Earlier this year, Warner said he worried the US was more vulnerable than in 2020, in part because of diminished communication between government and tech companies. He said he’s satisfied by the government’s recent work, citing a greater number of public briefingsand warnings, but is concerned that the greatest test is likely still ahead.
“The bad guys are not going to do most of this until October,” Warner said. “So we have to be vigilant.”
Daesh supporters turn to AI to bolster online support
A January study by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point said AI could be used to generate and distribute propaganda, to recruit using AI-powered chatbots, to carry out attacks using drones or other autonomous vehicles, and to launch cyber-attacks
Updated 16 min 3 sec ago
Reuters
BEIRUT: Days after a deadly Daesh attack on a Russian concert hall in March, a man clad in military fatigues and a helmet appeared in an online video, celebrating the assault in which more than 140 people were killed.
“The Daesh delivered a strong blow to Russia with a bloody attack, the fiercest that hit it in years,” the man said in Arabic, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, an organization that tracks and analyzes such online content.
But the man in the video, which the Thomson Reuters Foundation was not able to view independently, was not real — he was created using artificial intelligence, according to SITE and other online researchers.
Federico Borgonovo, a researcher at the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think tank, traced the AI-generated video to an Daesh supporter active in the group’s digital ecosystem.
This person had combined statements, bulletins, and data from Daesh’s official news outlet to create the video using AI, Borgonovo explained.
Although Daesh has been using AI for some time, Borgonovo said the video was an “exception to the rules” because the production quality was high even if the content was not as violent as in other online posts.
“It’s quite good for an AI product. But in terms of violence and the propaganda itself, it’s average,” he said, noting however that the video showed how Daesh supporters and affiliates can ramp up production of sympathetic content online.
Digital experts say groups like Daesh and far-right movements are increasingly using AI online and testing the limits of safety controls on social media platforms.
A January study by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point said AI could be used to generate and distribute propaganda, to recruit using AI-powered chatbots, to carry out attacks using drones or other autonomous vehicles, and to launch cyber-attacks.
“Many assessments of AI risk, and even of generative AI risks specifically, only consider this particular problem in a cursory way,” said Stephane Baele, professor of international relations at UCLouvain in Belgium.
“Major AI firms, who genuinely engaged with the risks of their tools by publishing sometimes lengthy reports mapping them, pay scant attention to extremist and terrorist uses.”
Regulation governing AI is still being crafted around the world and pioneers of the technology have said they will strive to ensure it is safe and secure.
Tech giant Microsoft, for example, has developed a Responsible AI Standard that aims to base AI development on six principles including fairness, reliability and safety, privacy and security, inclusiveness, transparency, and accountability.
In a special report earlier this year, SITE Intelligence Group’s founder and executive director Rita Katz wrote that a range of actors from members of militant group Al-Qaeda to neo-Nazi networks were capitalizing on the technology.
“It’s hard to understate what a gift AI is for terrorists and extremist communities, for which media is lifeblood,” she wrote.
CHATBOTS AND CARTOONS
At the height of its powers in 2014, Daesh claimed control over large parts of Syria and Iraq, imposing a reign of terror in the areas it controlled.
Media was a prominent tool in the group’s arsenal, and online recruitment has long been vital to its operations.
Despite the collapse of its self-declared caliphate in 2017, its supporters and affiliates still preach their doctrine online and try to persuade people to join their ranks.
Last month, a security source told Reuters that France had identified a dozen Daesh-K handlers, based in countries around Afghanistan, who have a strong online presence and are trying to convince young men in European countries, who are interested in joining up with the group overseas, to instead carry out domestic attacks.
Daesh-K is a resurgent wing of Daesh, named after the historical region of Khorasan that included parts of Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia.
Analysts fear that AI may facilitate and automate the work of such online recruiters.
Daniel Siegel, an investigator at social media research firm Graphika, said he came across chatbots that mimicked dead or incarcerated Daesh militants in earlier research he conducted before joining the firm.
He told the Thomson Reuters Foundation that it was unclear if the source of the bots was the Daesh or its supporters, but the risk they posed was still real.
“Now (Daesh affiliates) can build these real relationships with bots that represent a potential future where a chatbot could encourage them to engage in kinetic violence,” Siegel said.
Siegel interacted with some of the bots as part of his research and he found their answers to be generic, but he said that could change as AI tech develops.
“One of the things I am worried about as well is how synthetic media will enable these groups to blend their content that previously existed in silos into our mainstream culture,” he added.
That is already happening: Siegel had tracked videos of popular cartoon characters, like Rick and Morty and Peter Griffin, singing Daesh anthems on different platforms.
“What this allows the group or sympathizers or affiliates to do is target specific audiences because they know that the regular consumers of Sponge Bob or Peter Griffin or Rick and Morty, will be fed that content through the algorithm,” Siegel said.
EXPLOITING PROMPTS
Then there is the danger of Daesh supporters using AI tech to broaden their knowledge of illegal activities.
For its January study, researchers at the Combating Terrorism Center at Westpoint attempted to bypass the security guards of Large Language Models (LLMs) and extract information that could be exploited by malicious actors.
They crafted prompts that requested information on a range of activities from attack planning to recruitment and tactical learning, and the LLMs generated responses that were relevant half of the time.
In one example that they described as “alarming,” researchers asked an LLM to help them convince people to donate to Daesh.
“There, the model yielded very specific guidelines on how to conduct a fundraising campaign and even offered specific narratives and phrases to be used on social media,” the report said.
Joe Burton a professor of international security at Lancaster University, said companies were acting irresponsibly by rapidly releasing AI models as open-source tools.
He questioned the efficacy of LLMs’ safety protocols, adding that he was “not convinced” that regulators were equipped to enforce the testing and verification of these methods.
“The factor to consider here is how much we want to regulate, and whether that will stifle innovation,” Burton said.
“The markets, in my view, shouldn’t override safety and security, and I think — at the moment — that is what is happening.”
Why Afghanistan’s high rates of childhood lead exposure are a cautionary tale for the Middle East
Lead poisoning is a silent epidemic in Afghanistan, damaging the brains and futures of nearly all Afghan children
Contaminated cookware, battery recycling, and conflict remnants are poisoning millions, harming cognitive development
Updated 27 August 2024
Nadia Al-Faour
DUBAI: With one of the world’s highest rates of childhood lead exposure, Afghanistan is in the midst of a major public health crisis, perpetuating a cycle of poverty, illness and lost potential, in what could be a cautionary tale for impoverished and war-devastated countries in the Middle East.
It is estimated that almost all Afghan children have some degree of lead poisoning, which can result in brain damage, irreversible loss of intelligence, behavioral difficulties and learning problems.
A 2020 survey found that one in three children has lead in their blood above the threshold for lead poisoning, meaning they could suffer damage to their cardiovascular system and internal organs, and experience behavioral problems in adulthood.
It is estimated that almost all Afghan children have some degree of lead poisoning, which can result in brain damage, irreversible loss of intelligence, behavioral difficulties and learning problems. (AFP)
The “Toxic Truth” report by the UN children’s fund, UNICEF, and the non-profit environmental health organization Pure Earth estimates that about 800 million children worldwide have blood lead levels exceeding 5 micrograms per deciliter.
“The consequences of lead poisoning for global health, for children’s education and for overall development and economic growth are staggering,” Rachel Bonnifield, a senior fellow at the US-based Center for Global Development, told a recent conference on lead and public health.
While some of those affected live in wealthy countries, it is mainly poor countries such as Afghanistan that have the highest rates of lead poisoning, as their populations are more likely to be exposed to lead from multiple sources.
These sources can include inhaling dust and fumes from lead-acid battery recycling operations, being around open-air smelters, as well as eating food contaminated by cookware containing traces of lead and lead-infused spices such as turmeric.
Afghan children play on the remains of an old destroyed Soviet tank in the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad on September 29, 2012. (AFP)
Children playing or working in lead-contaminated spaces such as electronic waste dumps also face a high risk of exposure.
Lead poisoning is a serious health issue in the Middle East, with significant impacts in countries such as Iraq, Yemen and Egypt.
In Iraq, decades of conflict have left high levels of lead contamination, especially near industrial sites and in urban areas, leading to widespread health problems among children, including cognitive impairments and developmental delays.
In Yemen, lead poisoning has been exacerbated by the use of contaminated water sources and the lack of proper waste management, resulting in elevated blood lead levels in children.
Similarly, in Egypt, the use of leaded paint and lead-infused pottery has contributed to widespread exposure.
INNUMBERS
815m Children worldwide who have exposure levels considered as lead poisoning.
20% Proportion of learning gap between rich and poor countries attributable to lead poisoning.
5.5m Deaths each year caused by cardio-vascular diseases linked to lead exposure.
(Source: CGD)
Gaza has also seen significant rates of lead poisoning, in part owing to Israel’s 2008 ban on the export of used batteries, which resulted in mountains of discarded units piling up in the overcrowded enclave, where their chemical contents leak and contaminate the soil and water.
According to the World Health Organization, there is no safe level of lead exposure. Even low levels have been shown to damage cognitive development, IQ and attention span in children.
Juvenile delinquent behavior and adult violence have also been associated with lead exposure. Studies have found that pupils with a lower concentration of lead in their blood are less likely to commit crimes or be arrested.
In Afghanistan, however, few are even aware that they and their children are being poisoned, nor are they aware of the health consequences.
An Afghan labourer makes metal pots at an aluminum factory in Herat on January 22, 2019. (AFP)
Afghans who work in electrical waste dumps or metal work factories have little or no protection. Many wrap scarves around their faces as a makeshift guard against the fumes. Few of them wear gloves as they carry scrap to the furnace, raising the likelihood of contamination.
Some of these factories produce pressure cookers and cooking pots called kazans, which Afghans use to cook their daily meals — unaware of the lead contaminants seeping into their food from the cheaply made alloy.
A kazan, usually made out of low-quality recycled aluminum, is a kitchenware staple in Afghanistan. Their popularity has thereby contributed to widespread lead poisoning.
Some factories produce pressure cookers and cooking pots called kazans, which Afghans use to cook their daily meals — unaware of the lead contaminants seeping into their food from the cheaply made alloy. (Shutterstock)
The Taliban government, which returned to power in 2021, appears to lack the financial means and political will to address the problem, as it wrestles with a succession of humanitarian emergencies and security threats amid its continuing isolation by the international community.
“The government is not taking any measures to stop the exposure,” said Ali, a Kabul-based Afghan who spoke to Arab News on condition of anonymity. “I don’t think the men who work in the dump and metal fields are aware of the dangers of their work.
“The men work to put food on their family’s table. Where do you start to explain that even the cookware is poisoning them?”
Baffled by high levels of lead found in children arriving in America from Afghanistan, US researchers conducted studies on kazans and other aluminum cookware, only to find the products far exceeded the US Food and Drug Administration’s limit for lead content.
As a result, multiple states have put out warnings against the use of Afghan pressure cookers. This year, Washington state banned the manufacture, sale and distribution of lead-contaminated pots altogether.
However, Afghan cookware is not the only source of lead contamination.
Decades of conflict in Afghanistan have left the country littered with the remnants of spent and unexploded munitions and ordnance, and the wreckage of military vehicles, polluting the environment with lead and other harmful elements.
Additionally, the use of kohl — a kind of eyeliner worn to guard against the sun’s glare and as part of traditional dress — is also a culprit of lead poisoning.
Dr. Cyriac Abby Philips, an India-based specialist in hepatology and liver transplant medicine, says that lead poisoning is among the most damaging things to a child’s physical development.
Afghan deminers from the Halo Trust prepare to detonate unexploded ordnance (UXO) at a hill in Deh Sabz district of Kabul on May 21, 2024. (AFP)
In a recent thread on the social media platform X, Philips said that even exposure to small amounts of lead can result in children appearing “inattentive, hyperactive and irritable.”
“Afghanistan has a major public health crisis,” Philips said. “Almost all children have lead poisoning there.”
He added: “Children with greater lead levels may also have problems with learning and reading, delayed growth and hearing loss. Studies show that lead exposure leads to reduced IQ in children, and this reduction in IQ carries on into adulthood.
“It also causes attention deficit disorders and has been linked to both Parkinson’s disease and, more recently, Alzheimer’s disease. Children who survive severe lead poisoning may be left with permanent intellectual disability and behavioral disorders.”
An Afghan internally-displaced woman cooks in front of her tent at Shaidayee refugee camp in Injil district of Herat province on February 20, 2022. (AFP)
Although lead poisoning is a complex challenge that will take time to solve, the Center for Global Development says it remains entirely feasible to end childhood lead poisoning by the year 2040.
The center says the international community must invest $350 million to tackle the three known sources of lead exposure — paint, spices and battery recycling. Money should also be allocated to research and to raising public awareness about the dangers of lead contamination.
UNICEF has outlined a six-pronged approach to tackling the scourge of lead poisoning, including monitoring and reporting systems and building capacity for blood testing and identifying lead-contaminated sites.
It also calls for control measures to prevent children and pregnant women from being exposed to lead, including guarantees of adequate nutrition and the elimination or replacement of lead in cookware.
Workers make traditional tin stoves at a tin workshop in Kabul on September 19, 2023. (AFP)
Furthermore, UNICEF calls for the provision of training for health care providers on how to identify and manage lead exposure in children and pregnant women, as well as providing enhanced educational interventions and services alongside cognitive behavioral therapy.
Additionally, governments should launch public awareness campaigns on the dangers and sources of lead poisoning.
Legislation, including the development of health and safety precautions and standards, especially in substances that contain lead such as paint, lead-acid batteries and other e-waste, is also necessary.
This also extends to eliminating lead compounds in gasoline, children’s toys, cosmetics, spices and medicines.
Finally, global and regional action is required to create a global standard unit of measures to track and verify pollution and public health, as well as establishing partnerships and creating international standards for the recycling of lead-infused products.
Trump, Harris agree to mute mics for Sept. 10 US presidential debate, Trump says
Trump said the rules for next month’s debate will be the same as they were for the June CNN debate he had with President Joe Biden
Harris’ campaign had said it wanted the broadcaster to keep the candidates’ microphones on throughout the event
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters
WASHINGTON: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Tuesday an agreement has been reached to have closed microphones at the Sept. 10 US presidential debate with Democratic rival Kamala Harris.
The Harris campaign did not immediately return a request for confirmation about the ABC-hosted debate.
The candidates campaigns clashed on Monday over the previously agreed-upon debate, with the vice president’s team seeking a return to open microphones while Trump threatened to pull out entirely after suggesting the network was biased.
In a social media post on Tuesday, Trump said the rules for next month’s debate will be the same as they were for the June CNN debate he had with President Joe Biden, whose poor performance led him to drop out of the 2024 race.
“The Debate will be ‘stand up,’ and Candidates cannot bring notes, or ‘cheat sheets.’ We have also been given assurance by ABC that this will be a ‘fair and equitable’ Debate, and that neither side will be given the questions in advance,” Trump wrote.
The CNN debate did not have a live audience. Trump’s post did not mention that.
Harris’ campaign had said it wanted the broadcaster to keep the candidates’ microphones on throughout the event, not muted when their opponent was speaking as in the last presidential debate. So-called “hot mics” can help or hurt political candidates, catching offhand comments that sometimes were not meant for the public.
While Trump’s team said it had already agreed to have closed microphones, Trump later told reporters that he preferred to have his microphone kept on.
Trump’s campaign has floated an additional debate on Sept. 4 on Fox News network but the Harris team rejected that.
Greek-flagged oil tanker appears to be leaking oil, Pentagon says
The Sounion was the third vessel operated by Athens-based Delta Tankers to be attacked in the Red Sea this month
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters
WASHINGTON: The Greek-flagged crude oil tanker Sounion that was recently attacked by Yemen’s Houthis is still on fire in the Red Sea and now appears to be leaking oil, a Pentagon spokesman said on Tuesday.
The Sounion was targeted last week by multiple projectiles off Yemen’s port city of Hodeidah. The Houthis, who control Yemen’s most populous regions, said they attacked it in the Red Sea, as the Iran-aligned group has been attacking ships in solidarity with Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
Pentagon spokesman Air Force Major General Patrick Ryder said that a third party had tried to send two tugs to help salvage the Sounion, but the Houthis threatened to attack them. He said the tanker was carrying about 1 million barrels of crude oil.
“These are simply reckless acts of terrorism which continue to destabilize global and regional commerce, put the lives of innocent civilian mariners at risk and imperil the vibrant maritime ecosystem in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, the Houthis’ own backyard,” Ryder added.
The Sounion was the third vessel operated by Athens-based Delta Tankers to be attacked in the Red Sea this month. The attack caused a fire onboard, which the crew extinguished, Delta Tankers said in a statement.
