In a statement late on Saturday, the coalition said the vessel belonged to the UAE Marine Dredging Company "on its usual route to and from Aden to transfer relief and medical aid and evacuate wounded civilians to complete their treatment outside Yemen." The vessel, an Australian-built high speed logistics catamaran under lease to the United Arab Emirates military, was attacked by Houthi fighters near the Bab al-Mandab strait off Yemen's southern coast on Saturday. A military source said Ansarullah fighters and allied army forces launched rockets at an HSV-2 Swift hybrid catamaran operated by the Emirati navy off the shores of the Red Sea port city of Mokha early on Saturday, al-Masirah television reported. "In any case, the Yemeni people consider the Emiratis and Saudis their enemies and so anything belonging to them is a legitimate target," said al-Bukhaiti, speaking to CNN by phone Sunday from the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, which is run by Houthi rebels since they seized it last year. A senior Emirati military commander and three Saudi-backed foreign mercenaries had been killed in an attack by Yemeni forces in the Dhubab district of the southwestern province of Ta’izz two months earlier.
Houthi forces launch rockets that hit and reportedly destroy HSV-2 Swift, a military vessel belonging to the United Arab Emirates Navy, off the coast of Yemen, near the strategic Red Sea port of Mokha.