Rising Houthi conflict in Red Sea zone hits Pakistan’s shipping, trade

New Delhi: A significant share of Pakistan’s foreign exchange earnings depends on overseas remittances from Pakistani nationals working as crew on merchant ships, and trade flows tied to Karachi and Gwadar ports.

For both these earning streams the Gulf of Aden and the Bab al-Mandeb corridor plays a key role, but with Yemen’s Houthi forces involved in an escalating conflict in the region both trade and shipping have been hit, according to an article in The Global Kashmir.

The article points out that while earlier these was a merely a piracy problem in the region, which could be managed through coalition patrols and escorted transit, the situation has drastically changed since late 2023 missile and drone attacks tied to the wider regional conflict involving Yemen’s Houthi forces making it a more dangerous zone.

It highlights that thus shift has changed the kind of naval capability required to operate in the region to protect trade and merchant shipping which Pakistan does not have.

It also points out that while Pakistan is critically dependent on this corridor, it cannot independently improve the corridor’s security, since the naval assets actually capable of intercepting missiles, escorting vulnerable shipping, or responding rapidly to an attack belong to a small number of other countries and the multinational structures they lead.

“Pakistan is left holding the economic exposure without holding any of the operational tools to manage it,” observes the article by Mehaq Farooq

Conditions in the corridor have deteriorated repeatedly since 2023, which has adversely resulted in elevated insurance costs, disrupted shipping schedules, a harder environment for Pakistan’s seafarers to work in. However, Islamabad does not have the resources to manage this threat, the article states.

Its current Naval operations are confined to protecting Pakistan-flagged shipping on defined routes closer to home. These do not take care of Pakistan’s far larger economic stake in foreign-flagged shipping and overseas labour passing through the Bab al-Mandeb itself — the exposure that actually drives the country’s dependence on this corridor’s stability, the article further states.

Building independent naval reach into a corridor this distant would require resources and strategic prioritization Pakistan’s current defence posture does not reflect,

Pakistan’s economy is highly “leveraged to a single maritime corridor, with this little independent capacity to influence what happens inside it, is carrying a form of risk that shows up in national accounts long before it shows up in any naval budget line — and that risk will keep compounding for as long as the mismatch between economic dependence and operational reach goes unaddressed,” the article concludes.

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