The British oil company British Petroleum (BP) on Monday suspended all movement of its tankers through the Red Sea after the escalation of Houthi attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea.
Bloomberg quoted a company statement as saying, “In light of the deteriorating security situation for shipping in the Red Sea, BP decided to temporarily stop all transit operations through the Red Sea.”
“The safety and security of our employees and those who work on our behalf is a priority for BP,” she added.
The price of Brent crude oil rose by 0.68% at the time of preparing this report to $77.07, and the price of a barrel of US West Texas crude oil increased by 0.63% to $71.9.
For its part, Evergreen said that it had decided to temporarily stop accepting Israeli goods with immediate effect, and issued instructions to its container ships to suspend navigation through the Red Sea until further notice.
The company added, in a statement, that ships in the regional services of the Red Sea ports will sail to nearby safe waters and await further notice, while container ships scheduled to pass through the Red Sea will be redirected around the Cape of Good Hope to continue their trips to the ports.
55 ships diverted to the Cape of Good Hope route around the continent of Africa to avoid passing through the Red Sea during the period from last November 19 to yesterday, Sunday, after the Houthi group’s attacks in Yemen increased on ships heading to Israel, according to what the head of the Suez Canal Authority, Osama Rabie, said yesterday. .
On November 19, the Yemeni Houthi group announced the seizure of the “Galaxy Leader” cargo ship owned by an Israeli businessman in the Red Sea and taking it to the Yemeni coast.
The group has vowed on more than one occasion to target ships owned or operated by Israeli companies “in solidarity with Palestine,” against the backdrop of Israel’s war on Gaza, calling on countries to withdraw their citizens working on the crews of these ships.
The attacks continued against ships that the group says are linked to Israel, which prompted several container shipping companies to suspend their flights through the Red Sea until further notice.
The most prominent of these three companies are classified as the largest container shipping companies in the world, which are “MSC”, “AP Moller-Maersk”, and “CMA-CGM”.
The German shipping company “Hapag-Lloyd” announced last Friday that it was studying whether to stop sailing through the Red Sea, hours after it was reported that one of its ships had been attacked near Yemen.
Shipping charges
Reuters quoted sources as saying that the cost of shipping goods through the Red Sea is rising with the escalation, amid fears that the impact of the matter will extend to disrupting global supplies sailing through the region.
Duncan Potts, a former vice admiral in the British Royal Navy and former commander of maritime security in the Gulf, said that the Houthi attacks have the potential to become a global strategic economic threat much more than just a regional geopolitical threat.
The London insurance market has listed the southern Red Sea among the high-risk areas, and ships must notify insurance companies of sailing through these areas, as well as pay an additional premium, usually for a coverage period of 7 days.
War risk premiums rose last week to between 0.1 and 0.15% to 0.2% of the ship’s value, compared to 0.07% the previous week.
The share of goods coming from the south of the canal – crossing the Bab el-Mandeb Strait – amounts to about 47% of the volume of goods transiting the Suez Canal, according to statistics from the Suez Canal Authority.
In addition, about 98% of goods and ships coming from the south of the Suez Canal in Egypt pass through the Bab al-Mandab Strait in Yemen.
