UN Can’t Confirm Iran Involved in September Attack on Saudi Arabia

Yemen's Houthis took credit for the attack, Iran denied involvement

According to a new UN report on the September drone attack on Saudi Arabia’s drone facilities, the UN is still unable to confirm any Iranian involvement in the attack, despite the US repeatedly presenting that as undeniable.

This is a difficult thing to confirm, because the drones came from Yemen, and Yemen’s Shi’ite Houthi movement took credit for the attack. Iran denied any part in the attack, but the US insisted it was Iran.

Attempts to tie the Houthis to Iran are also changing, with the US admitting Tuesday that they no longer consider the Houthis to be a proxy of Iran, but rather an independent Yemeni faction with its own priorities.

The UN investigators got access to debris of weapons involved in the attack, and have not been able to corroborate claims that they are of Iranian origin, which is the last thing this allegation is all resting on.

UN Security Council officials say that the investigation is continuing and they’ll hear if anything else is figured out. Blaming Iran was a heavily political decision to begin with, and there may not be immediate interest in rubber stamping that claim just now.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.