UN Investigators Unable to Trace Saudi Aramco Attack to Iran

UN Secretary-General comments in report on September strike
U.S., Saudi officials blamed Iran for strike on oil facility

Workers repair tank structures at Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq crude oil processing plant on Sept. 20.Photographer: Faisal Al Nasser/Bloomberg

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By David Wainer

December 10, 2019 at 9:32 PM UTC

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United Nations investigators dispatched to Saudi Arabia after drone and missile attacks on state oil company Aramco in September determined they couldn’t yet verify U.S. and Saudi claims that Iran was behind the strikes.

The UN “is unable to independently corroborate that the cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles used in these attacks are of Iranian origin and were transferred in a manner inconsistent with” UN resolutions, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres wrote in his semi-annual Iran report to the security council obtained by Bloomberg News.