Ship evacuated after first civilian fatalities in Houthis' Red Sea attacks

India's navy evacuated all 20 crew from a stricken vessel in the Red Sea on Thursday, after a Houthi attack killed three seafarers in the first civilian fatalities from the Yemeni group's campaign against the key shipping route.

The Iran-aligned militants fired a missile at the Barbados-flagged, Greek-operated True Confidence on Wednesday about 50 nautical miles off the port of Aden, setting it ablaze.

In a statement, the owners and manager said all 20 crew and three armed guards on board were taken to hospital in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa by an Indian warship.

Two of the dead were Filipino nationals, while the third was Vietnamese, the owners and managers said, expressing condolences to families. Two other Filipinos were also severely injured.

Images released by the Indian Navy showed a helicopter winching crew members from a small life raft in choppy seas and taking them to a naval ship.

Some wounded were shown lying in the bottom of a navy lifeboat sent to assist. They were carried on stretchers onto the ship and were shown later with heavily bandaged limbs as they were evacuated to the Djibouti hospital.

"The vessel is drifting well away from land and salvage arrangements are being made," the companies said in the statement.

The Houthis have kept up a relentless campaign of attacks on vessels in one of the world's busiest shipping lanes since November, in what they say is solidarity with the Palestinians during Israel's war with Hamas in Gaza.



Reuters