The Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Major General Mohsen Rezaei, says that while Tehran backs the Houthi-led “resistance”, it is not responsible for Houthi actions in Yemen’s Bab al-Mandab Strait, Al Jazeera reports.
“The Houthis are not an Iranian military unit, and decisions concerning Yemeni territory are made by the Yemenis themselves,” Rezaei tells US news publication DropSite.
“Regarding [the] Bab al-Mandab, you should not automatically assume that what Iran does in Hormuz will be repeated there in exactly the same way. These are two different straits, two different political situations and two different actors.”
Rezaei adds that there is no joint Iranian-Yemeni decision to completely close the Bab al-Mandeb to commercial shipping, noting that the Houthis don’t need “Iranian instructions to understand the strategic importance” of the waterway.
“Anyone planning for a prolonged regional war should understand that stability in Hormuz, the Red Sea, and Bab al-Mandab cannot be separated indefinitely from the region’s overall security situation,” he adds.
