Huge explosions have struck Qatar’s primary liquefied natural gas production site and the Saudi Arabian capital Riyadh, hours after Iran threatened to launch what it called a “full scale economic war” by targeting energy facilities across the Middle East.
Video footage showed large blasts at Ras Laffan, Qatar’s main LNG production hub, as well as explosions lighting up the night sky over Riyadh, where an orange fireball was captured on camera as missiles struck the city. Energy sites across Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar had been evacuated earlier in the day after Tehran warned it would hit them “in the coming hours,” describing the facilities as “direct and legitimate targets.”
QatarEnergy confirmed the scale of the damage in a statement, saying emergency response teams had been deployed immediately to contain fires at Ras Laffan, adding that “extensive damage has been caused.” The company said all personnel had been accounted for and that no casualties had been reported at that time. The Qatari government separately confirmed it was dealing with a fire in the Ras Laffan area.
Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Majed Al Ansari condemned Israel’s earlier strike on the South Pars gas field — the world’s largest — as “reckless and irresponsible.” The South Pars field and the adjacent North Dome field have long been shared between Iran and Qatar, making the area a particularly sensitive target. Iran’s strike on Ras Laffan followed Israel’s attack on the Iranian portion of the field earlier the same day.
The strikes sent the price of Brent crude surging by more than five per cent to above $109 a barrel on Tuesday afternoon.
The energy infrastructure attacks came on a day of further significant developments in the conflict. Israel confirmed the killing of Iran’s intelligence minister Esmail Khatib in an overnight airstrike in Tehran, with Defence Minister Israel Katz declaring he had been “eliminated” and promising more “significant surprises” to come as Israeli forces continued targeting senior Iranian officials. The strikes also coincided with funeral proceedings in Iran for Ali Larijani, the national security chief whose assassination was confirmed by Tehran on Monday, alongside military commander Gholamreza Soleimani.
The full extent of damage to Qatar’s LNG infrastructure and the wider impact on global energy supply chains is expected to become clearer in the hours ahead.
