SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Cruise missiles and ballistic missiles were used alongside drones in the attack on the United Arab Emirates, the UAE ambassador to the U.S. said on Thursday.
Three people were killed and six wounded on Monday when three tanker trucks exploded in Abu Dhabi, the UAE capital.
Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi group said the group fired “a large number” of drones and five ballistic missiles in the attack.
Abu Dhabi police said they found parts of small planes that could possibly be drones.
“Several attacks – a combination of cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and drones – targeted civilian sites in the UAE. Several were intercepted,” UAE ambassador Yousef Al Otaiba told an online panel hosted by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), according to Reuters.
The UAE had “long left the Yemen war,” Otaiba said in his comments to JINSA. “Attacking a country that is not in combat makes a very clear case” to reinstate the Houthi terrorist designation.
The UAE is part of a Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis in Yemen. While the UAE said in 2020 it had withdrawn its own troops, it has armed and trained Yemeni forces that joined fighting this year against the Houthis in the energy-producing Shabwa and Marib regions.
In response to the attacks, U.S. President Joe Biden said on Wednesday his administration was considering re-designating the Houthis an international terrorist organization.
The Biden administration lifted that designation last February; the UAE has called for it to be restored.
On Tuesday, the Saudi-led coalition fighting Yemen’s Houthi group said it had begun air strikes against strongholds and camps in Sanaa belonging to the Houthi group.
At least 20 people were killed in airstrikes carried out by the coalition on Sanaa overnight, Houthi media and resident said.
Iran’s foreign ministry said military attacks were not a solution to the crisis in the region.
“Iran has always emphasized that the solution to any regional crisis is not to resort to war and violence, and only in a calm atmosphere… one can hope to establish peace and stability,” ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said on Tuesday.
