NEW YORK CITY: The UN Security Council on Thursday expressed its overwhelming condemnation of Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and near-unanimous solidarity with Riyadh, as member states warned that Yemen risked sliding back into full-scale war for the first time since a 2022 truce agreement. The emergency session was requested by the UK, the council’s penholder on Yemen, and Bahrain after Houthi forces launched renewed missile and drone strikes on Sept. 8 against several targets in southern Saudi Arabia, including a military air base and energy facilities. The attacks injured 73 people, including women and children, and sparked fires that temporarily disrupted operations at a major oil refinery in Jazan. The UN’s special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, told the council that his repeated warnings of a return to large-scale conflict had “now turned into a harsh reality.” Houthi forces had seized the port city of Mokha, he said, giving them “a direct presence on the shores of the world’s most vital straits” and raising further concern over freedom of navigation. Fighting had spread to Marib, Jouf and Al-Baida, he added, civilians were killed in Taiz, Hodeidah, Al-Baida and Jouf, and the shelling of displacement sites in Marib had killed children and destroyed shelters. More than 11,400 households have been displaced nationwide since Sept. 3, mostly from Taiz, Grundberg said, and fighting continues to drive people from their homes. He added that the UN had condemned the Houthi attacks on Saudi civilian and energy infrastructure, in which dozens of civilians were wounded. He repeated his call for the Houthis to halt attacks inside Yemen and across the border, as well as strikes and threats against commercial shipping. The escalation, he said, risks “dragging the country into the wider and unresolved regional confrontation, with global repercussions.” He urged all parties to respect international law and preserve the path to a political settlement. Speaking on behalf of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Bahrain’s envoy to the UN, Jamal Fares Alrowaiei, said the bloc “strongly condemns Houthi terrorist attacks against the sisterly Kingdom of Saudi Arabia” and the deliberate targeting of civilians and facilities in violation of international law and the UN Charter. He said the strikes “constitute a serious escalation and direct threat to the security and stability of the region,” and that GCC member states view the security of Saudi Arabia as “an integral part” of their own security. The bloc backed all measures taken by the Kingdom to protect its citizens and assets under its right to self-defense, and condemned Houthi threats to maritime security and freedom of navigation. It called on the council to hold “perpetrators and supporters” accountable. Jen Neidhart, political coordinator at the US Mission to the UN, said the strikes on Sept. 8 were “only the latest example” of the Houthis’ “blatant disregard” for Saudi sovereignty and civilian life. The group had used the same tactics against its own people, she added, bombing cities, displacing thousands of Yemeni families and destroying port infrastructure in Mokha worth tens of millions of dollars. She said the attacks were “flagrant violations” of both Saudi and Yemeni sovereignty and posed “a direct threat to regional and global energy security.” Neidhart said the Houthis were “agents and tools of Iran,” that “the Iranian hand behind these attacks is clear,” and she linked the strikes to a broader campaign to disrupt shipping the Bab Al-Mandab Strait and threaten global commerce. The US, she added, “stands firmly with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia” and its right to defend its territory and citizens, as well as with Yemen's government in its fight against “Houthi terrorism.” Washington demanded ab immediate end to all Houthi attacks against Saudi Arabia, Yemen’s legitimate government, and international shipping, and called for stronger enforcement of existing Security Council resolutions to cut off the resources that sustain the group. “The council must speak with one voice,” Neidhart said. “This escalation is unacceptable and those who enable it bear responsibility for its consequences.” The UK’s deputy permanent representative to the UN, Kate Foster, said the Houthis bear “full responsibility for this crisis.” She said their actions threatened freedom of navigation and transit through the Red Sea and Bab Al-Mandab Strait, the consequences of which would be “felt first and hardest by developing countries.” She noted that more than 22 million Yemenis needed humanitarian assistance and more than 18 million faced acute food insecurity, and said Iran’s “long-standing support for the Houthis continues to fuel instability,” as she called on Tehran to halt transfers of arms and other military support to the group. Pakistan’s envoy, Asim Iftikhar Ahmad, condemned strikes on civilian and economic targets in Abha, Jazan and Najran as a “flagrant violation” of Saudi sovereignty, and expressed his country’s “complete solidarity” with the Kingdom and its right to defend itself. The Danish deputy permanent representative, Sandra Jensen Landi, said Copenhagen “strongly condemns” the latest attacks and urged the Houthis to end all strikes inside Yemen and against international shipping. She called on Iran to refrain from provocations or threats against regional states, including through proxies, and to cease its support for the Houthis, which she said threatened the stability of Yemen and the wider region. China’s envoy, Fu Cong, stopped short of directly blaming the Houthis. He expressed concern over the “sharp escalation” and said the civilian casualties and damage to infrastructure were deplorable, as he condemned “all indiscriminate attacks on civilians and nonmilitary targets.” The situation had “reached a critical juncture” requiring intensified international peace efforts, he added, calling for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of both Yemen and Saudi Arabia to be respected, and urging all parties to move toward de-escalation and a political solution.