As Israel strikes Yemen, investigation reveals UN funding Houthis’ massive Russian oil tanker

Amid the ongoing exchange of fire between Israel and the Houthis – marked by ballistic missiles from Yemen and Israeli airstrikes on Red Sea ports – a surprising detail has come to light: the Houthis are operating a massive oil tanker that was purchased and is maintained with funding from the United Nations.

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According to an investigation by Lloyd’s List, the UN bought the tanker – now called Yemen – for the Iran-backed Houthis before the war in Gaza began, at a cost of $55 million.

The vessel was intended to avert an ecological disaster off the Yemeni coast by offloading oil from the decaying FSO Safer, a 49-year-old tanker the Houthis seized a decade ago that was anchoring off the port of Hodeidah and at risk of sinking.

After a global fundraising campaign, the UN purchased the Yemen and transferred it to a jointly owned company representing both the internationally recognized Yemeni government and the Houthis.

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The emergency operation to transfer 1.1 million barrels of oil from the Safer to the Yemen was completed in August 2023. But after the Houthis began targeting commercial ships in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, efforts to tow the tanker away from the region were suspended.

Since then, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) has continued to pay $450,000 a month to cover the tanker’s maintenance and crew salaries.

Meanwhile, the Yemen has reportedly been used for the past two years by the Houthis as a floating storage facility for Russian oil, effectively enabling them to skirt international sanctions on petroleum imports to ports under their control.

Lloyd’s List identified at least three instances in which tankers carrying Russian oil docked with the Yemen in open waters and transferred hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil.

Earlier this month, the Houthis reportedly drew oil from the tanker for the first time, loading it onto the Sea Star 1, a Panama-flagged vessel, and unloading it at the Houthi-controlled port of Ras Isa.

In response, the UNDP said it had sharply criticized every case of Russian oil being delivered to the Yemen and stressed that the transfer of oil from the FSO Safer had been essential to prevent a major environmental, humanitarian and economic catastrophe in the region.

Over the years, the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom and the UN have imposed numerous sanctions on the Houthis, primarily related to weapons smuggling and dual-use technologies.

Since the start of the Gaza war and the escalation in maritime attacks, additional restrictions have been placed on the Houthis’ sources of funding, including sanctions targeting 13 individuals and international entities – among them banks, Chinese refineries and foreign-owned tankers involved in oil trade with the Houthis.

Since the Houthis began firing ballistic and cruise missiles and launching drones at Israel, the Israeli military has carried out multiple strikes in Yemen in an effort to degrade their ability to import fuel. Israel said that rebuilding the bombed ports will take considerable time.

This week, the Israeli Air Force again struck infrastructure in Hodeidah, Ras Isa and As-Salif. Among the additional targets were a power station and the Galaxy Leader – a commercial ship formerly owned by Israeli businessman Rami Ungar that was hijacked by the Houthis in November 2023.

The ship has remained docked at the port of As-Salif since it was seized, but according to the Israeli military, the Houthis installed a maritime radar system on board and used it to target other vessels in the Red Sea.

Last month, the Israel Navy struck Hodeidah using precision-guided missiles launched from Sa’ar 6-class corvettes from hundreds of kilometers away.