The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen said on Tuesday that it intercepted three ballistic missiles and four drones launched by the Houthis toward Saudi Arabia.
Coalition spokesperson Colonel Turki al-Maliki said the missiles were aimed at the kingdom's Eastern Province and caused no casualties. The drones, he added, were heading for southern regions of the country. The Houthis had not immediately commented.
Ahead of the interceptions, Saudi Arabia's civil defense agency issued emergency alerts in the Eastern Province and Al Kharj Governorate. Once the alerts were lifted, the agency told residents to avoid crowds, refrain from filming and call 911 in an emergency. On Monday evening, the coalition had reported destroying three other drones over the Riyadh area and the southern region.
The latest attacks coincided with a diplomatic push in Tehran, where senior officials from Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan met their Iranian counterparts. They aimed to calm a regional conflict that began in February when the United States and Israel launched a war on Iran, a conflict that has also reignited fighting in Yemen.
Saudi Arabia said the visit was intended to open negotiating channels to "prevent the return of military escalation". Riyadh sent Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman, a younger brother of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Pakistan was represented by army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir, and Turkey by intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin. Iranian state media published images of President Masoud Pezeshkian, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi and Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, at the talks.
In a joint statement late on Monday, the four countries "agreed to continue the dialogue to strengthen cooperation amongst the four regional countries, including for peace and security in the region", Iranian state media reported. Pakistan and Qatar have led mediation between the US and Iran, which produced an interim peace agreement in June. Fighting between Iran and the US resumed soon afterward, and tensions between the Iran-aligned Houthis and Saudi Arabia opened a new front, worsening Yemen's humanitarian crisis.
Last month the Houthis took strategic areas along Yemen's Red Sea coast from Saudi-backed government forces in a rapid offensive, which prompted a counteroffensive. Saudi Arabia has since stepped up its strikes on the group. The Houthis have also hit Saudi airports, ports and oil facilities. An attack this month on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh killed at least 13 people and wounded more than 300, the deadliest attack on the kingdom in over a decade.
On Monday, the Houthis claimed another attack on the Riyadh airport and on crude oil pumping stations in western and eastern Saudi Arabia. The coalition said those missiles were intercepted and destroyed, and that it carried out retaliatory strikes that wiped out five tunnels used to store ballistic missiles, four missile launchers and a missile depot.
The wider war has restricted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and pushed up oil and gasoline prices. Egypt, a major financial and political partner of Saudi Arabia, has moved closer to the fighting as well: its Parliament on Monday authorised the military to help defend the kingdom.
