alicia kearns, welcome to hardtalk. now, you are chair of the uk parliament s foreign affairs select committee. you have to take an overview of what is happening across foreign policy. would you agree that right now the bandwidth of foreign policy thinking is very much taken up by israel, by the war in gaza? absolutely. and this is one of the challenges that democracies have. we need to make sure that we can t say, well, we only have bandwidth to focus on one conflict, because unfortunately we don t have the liberty to say we have only one to focus on. but secondly, we re not doing enough to stop conflict popping up in other places. so until we are doing that, we don t get to say, well, we can only focus on israel and gaza for the next month, or, we can only focus on ukraine. we have to find a way to do both, and that means more multilateral working, more leaning on one another, more dividing and conquering in terms of our assets and what we re focusing on. and yet su
starts now. good evening. we re following breaking ne. the u.s. and british military have launched strikes against targets in houthi controlled yemen, according to two u.s. officials. this comes after the iranian-backed militant group has launched a series of attacks on commercial ships in the red ahich has stoked fears of a wider conflict in the region already reeling from the israel/hamas war. we have a lot to get to. this is obviously a huge development in the region. you re looking at a map right there. the challenge has been that the houthi attacks have caused ships that would normally go through the suez canal to have to go around the horn of africa, meaning it takes a lot longer to get there. there have been some limited military strikes that have killed some houthis that were involved in this blockade. the houthis launched this blockade in protest to the killing of palestinians in gaza. so that is just the setup, the background to what s going on. the houthis are an
we ll bring you an interview with ecuador s president in the week will have elections on taiwan. we start tonight with reaction to the american and british air strikes on houthi targets in yemen. last night four royal air force typhoon fighterjets took part in the raids, along with us navyjets. this footage is from one of the two uk raf strikes. officials say 16 sites were targeted 16 sites, including in the capital city sana a. they included what the us called command and control centres, munitions depots, launching systems, production facilities and air defence radar systems. houthi leaders said five people were killed, and threatened to retaliate. the raids were in response to houthi attacks on ships in the red sea, which they say is in response to israel s attacks in gaza. fighters have been targeting ships with armed drones and missiles and boarding them. the british prime minister called the strikes necessary and proportionate in order to protect global trade in on
coverage of the iowa caucus will continue. see you sunday morning. happening now, u.s.-led air strikes inseed yemen trigger a vow of retaliation by iran-backed militants. mass protests erupt in yemen and fears of a full scale regional war intensify. also this hour, a potential blizzard and bitter cold are disrupting the final push to the iowa caucuses. we re tracking the candidates and severe weather with only three days to go before the first presidential votes of 2024. welcome to our viewers here in the united states and around the world. i m wolf blitzer, you re in the situation room. let s get to our top story tonight. iran-backed houthi militants vowing to hit back after a u.s. led coalition struck their position faze yemen. the national what is president biden saying as the u.s. braces for retaliation? wolf, the president spoke briefly earlier today reiterating that the united states stand as poised to respond to any additional houthi action including missile an
targets linked to houthis in yemen. president biden has issued the following statement today at my direction us military forces together with the uk and support from australia, bahrain, canada and the netherlands successfully conducted strikes against a number of targets in yemen used by houthi rebels to endanger freedom of navigation on one of the worlds most vital waterways did it let s get some immediate reaction to this development in the statement from the us president. let s quash now to washington and our correspondent there. what can you tell us? figs correspondent there. what can you tell us? correspondent there. what can you tell us? as you said we had a statement you tell us? as you said we had a statement from you tell us? as you said we had a statement from the you tell us? as you said we had a statement from the white - a statement from the white house confirming that the strikes have begun, saying it was the us, uk and lists a number of nations includ