FORCES of the Houthi-led Yemeni government took over Yemen’s port city of Mokha on Thursday, an area vital to controlling shipping through the Red Sea, according to reports.

Mokha is about 50 miles from the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a waterway that connects the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden and through which about 12 per cent of the world’s goods are typically shipped.

The Bab el-Mandeb’s importance to global oil supplies has grown since shipping through the nearby Strait of Hormuz has been impeded by Iran during the illegal and unprovoked war launched against it by the US and Israel.

Houthi-led Yemeni forces increased attacks against Yemen’s rival government and declared a blockade on Saudi Arabia, which has propped it up.

The Houthis’ takeover of Mokha was confirmed by Ahmed Baash, a commander with the National Resistance Forces allied with Yemen’s rival government, and Hazam al-Assad, a member of the Houthis’ political bureau.

Mokha represents the biggest territorial gain by Houthi-led Yemeni forces since a truce was signed in 2022 to end a civil war that began more than a decade ago.

Houthi-led forces have been at war with Yemen’s rival government since 2014, when the rebels swept down from their mountainous heartland and seized much of northern and central Yemen.

Saudi Arabia entered the war the following year on behalf of the rival government and its western supporters.

United Nations special envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg told the UN security council on Thursday: “This renewed war should alarm us all.

“It effectively marks the end of the relative calm that Yemen has experienced for over four years since the truce.”

He called on the international community to address this “new and more dangerous phase — one whose consequences, if left unchecked, will not stay within Yemen’s borders.”

The UN ambassador from the rival Yemeni government, Abdullah al-Saadi, called on the security council to condemn the Houthis’ military escalation and to implement measures “prohibiting the supply of arms, components, technology, and military expertise to the militia” which are fuelling the conflict.

Saudi UN ambassador Abdulaziz Alwasil said that the kingdom remains supportive of peace in Yemen but that it would “take all measures necessary to deter Houthi attacks.”

Ambassador Alwasil warned that “the kingdom’s commitment to de-escalation and to supporting a political solution must not be allowed to become an opportunity that this militia exploits to continue its attacks and to threaten the security of the kingdom and the region.”