According to a statement by the Pentagon on Sunday, the USS Mason responded to a distress call from the tanker, identified as Central Park by the vessel's company that it had been seized by armed individuals.
The statement said that the cargo ship was safe after the USS Mason and its allied ships demanded its release. It put the number of the attackers at five, saying that they tried to escape on a fast boat but they surrendered after they were chased by the US warship.
The statement also accused Yemen’s Ansarullah Movement of firing two ballistic missiles towards the general direction of the Mason and Central Park, but added that the projectiles landed about 10 nautical miles away from them, causing no damage or injuries, according to Reuters.
Ansarullah dismissed that. Mohammad al-Bukheiti, a senior member of the movement, said on Monday that allegations of the release of the seized ship by the US were “fabricated.”
He told Beirut-based Al Mayadeen Arabic News Network that the location of the tanker mentioned in the US narrative is not a suitable place to confiscate ships.
The Ansarullah member also said that the movement only targets ships, which belong to the Israeli regime, warning certain countries against intercepting missiles fired by the Yemeni armed forces.
Also on Monday, the US admitted that Ansarullah was not involved in the attempted hijacking of the tanker, as a Pentagon spokesman said that the five attackers were Somali pirates.
The incident was “clearly … piracy-related,” Patrick Ryder told reporters. “We're continuing to assess, but initial indications are that these five individuals are Somali,” according to Reuters.
Last week, Yemen’s Ansarullah seized an Israeli-linked cargo ship in the southern Red Sea in response to the regime’s war on Gaza. The movement has also launched a number of missile and drone attacks on Israeli positions, saying that those attacks will continue unless the regime stops its crimes against the Palestinian people in Gaza.
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