Claim: An image claims to show a consignment of weapons seized by Saudi and Yemeni authorities at the port of Aden sent by India for Houthi forces.
Fact: These weapons were actually seized by US guided-missile cruiser, the USS Monterey, from an unnamed ship in the Northern Sea in 2021
On 24 August, Facebook users posted images of weapons supposedly seized from an Indian ship,by Saudi and Yemen authorities.
The images were posted with an Urdu caption as seen below:
دن کی بندرگاہ پر سعودی بحریہ نے یمن کی فورسز کے ساتھ مل کر بڑی کروائی کی ہے جس میں بھارت ایکسپوز ہوا ہے۔
بھارت سے یمنی حوثیوں کے لئے بھیجی گئی اسلحہ کی بڑی کھیپ بحری جہاز سمیت ضبط کر لی گئی۔
اسلحہ بھارتی شیڈو جہاز کے ذریعے یمن میں حوثیوں کے لئے اسمگل کیا جا رہا تھا۔ اسلحے میں سنائپر رائفلز، آر پی جیز، راکٹ لانچرز، مشین گنز، ہینڈ گرنیڈز، اینٹی ایئر کرافٹ گنز، ڈرونز شامل ہیں۔ جس کے بعد حوثیوں کے ساتھ بھارتی تعلقات بھی کھل کر سامنے آ گئے اور بھارت کی سعودیہ مخالفت بھی کھل گئی ہے۔
[Translation:”The Saudi Navy has done a big deal together with Yemen’s forces at the port of Aden, in which India has been exposed.
A large consignment of weapons sent from India to the Yemeni Houthis were seized including a ship.
Weapons were being smuggled for the Houthis in Yemen via Indian shadow plane. The weapons include sniper rifles, RPGs, rocket launchers, machine guns, hand grenades, anti-aircraft guns, drones. After which Indian relations with the Houthis also exposed. And India’s opposition to Saudi has also opened up.”]
Screenshot from Facebook post
Fact or Fiction?
A keyword search of “Saudi Arabia”,”India” and “Port of Aden” did not produce any evidence of an operation involving Saudi Arabia and India at the Port of Aden.
Soch Fact Check ran a reverse-image search to investigate where the image originated from. The image appeared in news outlets and videos that reported a shipment of weapons intercepted by the USS Monetary on 6-7 August 2021.
Soch Fact Check found the same operation posted on the official Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) which records every US military operation that has taken place.This is the information that has been provided by the official state owned website:
Official Image extracted from Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS).
The mission took place on 6-7 August 2021 and was posted on 9 August 2021. The clip shows the precise image seen in the Facebook post at 0:05 seconds. As seen below, this is the official side-by-side comparison between the US owned website and Facebook image, proving that the image has been extracted from this website, and been used in a false context.
Left: Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS). Right: the viral claim.
The information from official news outlets and the US military website confirms that the operation, which took place in 2021 and not 2026, involved the US military and a stateless vessel in international waters, and not Saudi and Yemeni naval forces and an Indian ship.
Virality
The image was found on Facebook, and since it was posted it has received up to 2.1K likes and 740 reshares.
Conclusion: Saudi and Yemeni forces did not seize any weapons from an Indian ship at the Port of Aden in 2026. The image is from 2021, when the US Navy seized a shipment from an unnamed ship in the North Arabian Sea.
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