SAUDI ARABIA continued to detain Yemeni fuel ships yesterday as the war-stricken country faces its worst shortages since the start of the war in 2015.

The Yemen Petroleum Company (YPC) accused Riyadh of “piracy in the Red Sea” in a press conference in Sanaa in which officials said the aim was the raise oil prices and “create chaos across the country.”

Experts said that the war between Russian and Ukraine exposed the double standards of world bodies which have failed to act on the humanitarian crisis in Yemen where some 70 per cent of the population rely on aid.