Saudi Arabia: Satellite image reveals major damage that shut crucial oil pipeline

Satellite imagery shows a key oil pipeline in Saudi Arabia has been badly damaged after a strike last week, which experts have told BBC Verify could take more than a month to repair and force oil prices even higher.

The image shows the most significant damage is at a pumping station along the East-West Pipeline, which Saudi Arabia has increasingly relied on to export crude oil via the Red Sea rather than through the Strait of Hormuz, where ships have been attacked by Iran and the US during their six-month war.

The Saudi government has accused Iranian-backed militias in Iraq of the pipeline strike, which followed days of renewed missile and drone attacks on south-western Saudi Arabia by Yemen’s Houthi group – which is also backed by Iran. Saudi Arabia has retaliated by carrying out strikes on Houthi-controlled areas of western Yemen.

New satellite images also show damage to Saudi Arabia’s King Khalid Air Base after a Houthi strike last week.

The Saudi government said on Tuesday it would respond “firmly” to attacks by the Houthis.

While the Houthis have been fighting a long-running civil war against Saudi-backed Yemeni pro-government forces, the group has stepped up its campaign in recent weeks.

It seized control of significant new territory across Yemen’s south-western coast last week, including areas overlooking the crucial Bab al-Mandab waterway, strengthening its ability to enforce its declared blockade of Saudi shipping.