News - Yemen: Sana’a cannot allow the countries involved in aggression against Yemen to plunder its oil and gas wealth, Prime Minister Abdulaziz bin Habtoor said on Wednesday.

"There are 14 billion dollars in oil revenues that were supplied to the National Bank of Saudi Arabia, and they provided mercenaries with only one and a half billion," bin Habtoor confirmed.

He stressed that the government in Sana’a, and the Yemenis are counting on the political decision-maker in the capital of all Yemenis.

Yemen is rich with oil which is considered one of the main resources for the country. It gets exported and revenues are used in disbursing employee salaries. 

Since the beginning of the US-Saudi aggression on Yemen, the oil revenues of Yemen has been under the hands of the Saudi-led aggression and its mercenaries. It plunders wealth, occupies the land, and kills the people of Yemen.

In late July, Sultan Al-Arada – appointed by the aggression as a member of the so-called leadership council and governor of Marib - admitted in a television interview that the oil revenue funds are being supplied to the National Bank of Saudi Arabia, and not to any of the Yemeni banks, including those under the control of mercenaries.

In his televised interview with a British channel, he added that for years oil revenues have been supplied to an account in the Saudi National Bank, but he did not reveal the real numbers of those revenues that are supplied to the Saudi bank.

The press investigation – which was published in the International Center for Journalists under the title “Yemeni crude oil export figures” – confirms that the export of oil from Yemen has continued. From 2016 until the end of 2021, it reached about 189,170,730 barrels, while the value of its revenues amounted to approximately 13,025,761,831 billion dollars.

In merely 2021, the revenues were estimated at more than three billion dollars, while in 2022, with the rise in oil prices as a result of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the Yemeni crude oil production increased to 180,000 barrels per day, the number doubles dramatically, as the monthly revenues are estimated at about 500 million dollars every month. Thismeans that oil revenues are expected during the first half of this year to reach three billion dollars.

Meanwhile, Yemenis suffer from the interruption of salaries that they have been denied since 2016. While they suffer from high prices and inflation, hunger, death, disease, poverty, aggressive war, siege and starvation, the resources and proceeds of Yemeni crude oil go to the National Bank of Saudi Arabia.

The investigation – published by the International Center for Journalists under the title “Yemeni Oil Export Figures” – proves that whoever sells Yemeni oil is a committee made up of a number of mercenaries working under the supervision of the Saudi ambassador, Mohammed Al Jaber. About 80% of the oil’s financial proceeds return to a bank account in the Saudi National Commercial Bank. About 20% of the proceeds are redistributed to the mercenary leaders.

Abdul Raqib Mohammed, former director of the Revenue Sector Department at the Ministry of Finance, reveals that the revenue sector does not receive any data on the volume of actual exports of crude oil, nor the number of its revenues, except for the data that is allowed to be announced.

“The Central Bank for Control and Accountability, and the revenue sector in the ministry do not know anything about the policy used in calculating the prices of oil exports,” Abdul Raqib said. He stressed that “the real oil data is known only by specific people.”

Observers believe that these billions of dollars, if deposited in any Yemeni bank, will improve exchange rates, guarantee the payment of salaries and reduce prices, and improve the living conditions of Yemenis. However, the coalition – which claimed that it came to help the Yemenis – plunders these billions, as Saudi Arabia steals them to the accounts of its banks.