Following a fresh escalation in the war in Yemen over the last few days and reports of possible US involvement, Iran called for an end to all forms of external interference in the country and reiterated the need for the resumption of Yemeni-Saudi dialogue to end the decade-long conflict.

Iran “reiterates its principled and steadfast position regarding the necessity of respecting Yemen’s independence, national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the need to end the illegal and inhuman blockade of the country,” its Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Friday, September 11.

The statement followed the news of Saudi Arabia seeking fresh assistance from the US against the Ansar Allah-led Yemeni forces, who captured various strategic locations around the country’s Red Sea coast earlier this week in a fresh escalation in fights with Saudi-backed forces.

Saudi Arabia has already carried out over 60 air strikes in Yemen since the outbreak of the recent fights. On Thursday, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman reportedly called President Donald Trump asking for US military intervention as well.

The US has previously supplied key military assistance and weapons to the Saudi Arabia-led coalition in the war against Ansar Allah. It was withdrawn during the Joe Biden administration briefly, after a massive popular campaign against US involvement.

The US has bombed Yemen on several occasions in the past months, citing its alleged attacks on “freedom of navigation” in the Red Sea during the Yemeni campaign against Israel in support of the Palestinian people in Gaza.

US military involvement in Yemen

On Thursday, US officials admitted the US was ready to assist Saudi Arabia and forces backed by it in Yemen once again in order to “protect its core national security interest” in the region.

The US has once again defined its core interest in the region as the “protection of freedom of navigation” in the Red Sea through which around 12% of global trade passes.

The US claims Ansar Allah is acting as a proxy of Iran and sees the escalation in Yemen as an Iranian attempt to block oil trade through the Red Sea as well, after its ongoing blockade in the Strait of Hormuz.

This is despite Ansar Allah rejecting such media reports and assuring that their latest campaign does not threaten ship movements through the Bab al-Mandab.

Iran maintains that Ansar Allah is not a proxy but an independent force and an ally.

The US has already deployed over a 100 military advisors to Saudi Arabia to assist it in the war, according to reports in US media.

Saudi Arabia has imposed a comprehensive land, sea, and air blockade on Yemen since an international coalition led by it started the war in 2015. The blockade prevented the flow of crucial humanitarian supplies to the country causing a massive crisis, including hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dying due to the lack of food and medicine during the COVID outbreak.

The Saudi blockade even threatened flights carrying patients and people trapped outside the country from landing at Sanaa airport. The only exception was during a short period in 2022 when a pause in the war after rounds of negotiations facilitated by the UN had temporarily provided some relief.

Ansar Allah announced the end of the 2022 ceasefire following Saudi Arabia’s attacks on Sanaa airport in July, threatening an Iranian aircraft with diplomats demanding the immediate end of the decade-long blockade.

Noting that the people of Yemen have a right to “a dignified life free from pressure, intimidation and oppressive blockade,” Iran demanded the immediate resumption of the dialogue on the roadmaps already agreed upon in the past.

Iran also offered its offices to facilitate the Yemeni-Saudi dialogue.

Iran accused the US and its European allies of misusing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for their own narrow geopolitical objectives, eroding its credibility and paving the way for the ultimate collapse of the international non-proliferation regime.

The Islamic Republic’s response on Wednesday, September 9, followed the adoption of a resolution by the IAEA Board of Governors, which accused it of non-compliance with its safeguard regulations and referred Iran to the UN Security Council for further action.

The resolution, drafted jointly by the US, the UK, France, and Germany was adopted. A majority of 23 countries voted in favor and eight others abstained. China, Russia, and Niger voted against the resolution.

Thanks to the resolution, for which the US and its European allies lobbied aggressively, forcing several countries to vote in favor, Iran has been referred to the UNSC for the first time in over 20 years.

The resolution asks Iran to immediately start complying with IAEA regulations and resume inspections of its nuclear facilities, with the IAEA chief Rafael Grossi expressing concerns about lack of clarity about the fate of Iran’s enriched uranium and the conditions of its nuclear facilities since the beginning of the war.

Iran has denied any violation of the IAEA safeguards, pointing out that regular inspections of its nuclear facilities were suspended after the IAEA withdrew its inspectors due to safety concerns during the 12 days of US-Israeli bombings in June 2025.

Read more: How the US & Israel used Rafael Grossi to hijack the IAEA and start a war on Iran

Iran has also claimed that the IAEA demands for the immediate resumption of inspections to its nuclear sites and expecting the implementation of normal safeguards amidst the ongoing war is “materially impractical” and “irrational.”

It also accused the IAEA of failing to do its work properly and exposing without any need “highly confidential information regarding the nature and whereabouts of Iran’s nuclear stockpiles” without prior consent, Press TV reported.

Political resolution 

Iran accused that the resolution is politically motivated and biased. It further described it as yet another attempt by the US and Israel to force Iran’s “surrender” after failing to achieve anything through military means in the last year.

It questioned the US authority to sponsor such a resolution when it has repeatedly used force against Iran, in complete violation of previous IAEA resolutions calling for “diplomatic solutions” to its nuclear issue.

“Not only did they ignore all efforts for a diplomatic solution, but they also bombed peaceful, safeguarded nuclear sites, violated basic principles of international law, and the UN Charter, brutally committed war crimes, and killed thousands of civilians, including 168 children at a primary school and guests at a wedding,” Iran’s mission in Vienna said in a statement on Wednesday.

“They attack Iran’s nuclear facilities under the IAEA safeguards, disrupt the normal verification process, and then use that very disruption as a pretext for adopting a resolution” against Iran, Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister said in a post on X on Wednesday. 

Gharibabadi also dismissed any possibility of further action on the resolution in the UNSC as two permanent members, Russia and China, have opposed its adoption.

A joint statement issued by Russia and China after the vote on the resolution in the IAEA BOG called the resolution “irrelevant” and a pressure tactic designed to undermine the cooperation between Iran and the IAEA.

Underlining the absence of a reference to the ongoing US aggression against Iran, Russia and China maintained that it amounts to ignoring the “root cause and principle factor underlying the current situation.”

Iran “targeted two US vessels and eight oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, inflicting heavy damages to them,” the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said in a statement issued on Wednesday, September 9.

The IRGC claimed the attacks were carried out in retaliation to US attacks on five of its oil tankers in the Persian Gulf hours before.

On Tuesday, the US Central Command had claimed that it destroyed five Iranian oil tankers after Iran “targeted a US Navy warship with ballistic missiles twice over the past two days.” It also claimed that the Iranian attacks had failed to cause any harm to the warship or US personnel.

The IRGC claimed that 10 ships trying to cross the Strait of Hormuz through the “unauthorized” US-sponsored route near Oman were also attacked for violating its restrictions on navigation through the region.

“The Strait of Hormuz remains firmly under the surveillance and management of the capable and valiant IRGC navy,” the statement underlined, refuting the claims made by President Donald Trump earlier about the US Navy having full control over the crucial waterway that has been at the core of the latest rounds of the war.

Iran also carried out “large-scale” missile attacks on the US military base at Al-Azraq in Jordan on Tuesday night, targeting maintenance and deployment centers of F-35s, F-16s, and other fighter jets.

The Iranian Navy announced on Tuesday that it captured an advanced unmanned US Navy submersible or submarine at the entrance of the Strait of Hormuz.

The latest round of escalation in the six-month-long war on Iran is attributed to the failure of the US to force Iran to lift its blockade on the Strait of Hormuz. In violation of the terms of the peace deal signed in June, the US first bombed Iran various times and then shifted to economic warfare late last month. This is the second round of military escalation, which began earlier this month.

Read more: US resumes airstrikes on Iran after month-long pause

On Tuesday, both sides warned against further attacks, with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio threatening that Iran will lose more oil tankers if it continues its attacks on US naval ships in the region.

Chief of Staff of Iran’s armed forces Ali Abdollahi replied with his own set of threats, claiming if the US strikes Iranian oil tankers it will face retaliation against most of its military bases in the region.

US imposes fresh unilateral sanctions

On Tuesday, the US Department of the Treasury imposed fresh sanctions on Iran’s aviation sector as part of the so-called “operation economic outcast,” which is an attempt to economically isolate the country.

It targeted over two dozen airlines, both private and commercial, including Mahan Air Cargo Services, for their alleged role in the “regime’s destabilizing activities, in procurement and transfer of weapons and ferrying the personnel.”

The sanctions aim to stop the supply of new aircrafts and spare parts for the existing ones, as well as halting the support of general sales agents to the identified entities by “any foreign firm and individual,” threatening them “with serious consequences” for any violations. 

Last month, the US announced that it was launching an operation to economically isolate Iran, asking all the countries in the world to sever any kind of existing economic or trade relation with it, threatening them with US sanctions otherwise.

Most of the countries have not actively responded to Washington’s demand, except the UAE, which decided to suspend all its economic ties with Iran after US Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent announced the policy.

The economic isolation was announced as a superior strategy for dealing with Iran after months of military actions failed to force Iran to lift its blockade on the Strait of Hormuz.

UK joins the US economic war against Iran

The UK, a close US ally, announced its own fresh economic measures against Iran on Tuesday. The “sanctions” targeted UK supplies to crucial economic sectors in Iran, such as energy, mining, software, shipping, insurance, and banking, among others.

Iran sharply reacted to the UK’s unilateral move, calling it illegal and contrary to the shared interests of the two nations. It warned that “London’s alignment with the US policy of economic terrorism would further heighten the wall of mistrust between the two nations,” IRNA reported.

Reacting to the new set of sanctions against his country, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi questioned its “novelty,” claiming it was a sign of the Trump administration’s failures to achieve any of its goals in Iran. 

“After 47 years of sanctions, the US went to war with Iran on behalf of Israel. The fallout has been disastrous for America, including its standing worldwide. After failing to achieve its aims through sanctions or war, Washington’s “novel” solution is…more sanctions. Seriously?” Araghchi wrote in his post on X on Tuesday.

Read more: Iran reverses the asymmetry