Missiles fired from Yemen damaged a tower belonging to Saudi oil giant Aramco in the heart of Riyadh's financial district on Sunday, as Saudi air defences intercepted the attack in the early hours of the morning.

The Aramco Tower — a 36-storey landmark known as Villas in the Sky in the King Abdullah Financial District — had windows blown out across several floors, with video verified by the BBC showing at least one floor badly hit. Saudi Arabia's energy ministry said the building suffered only "minor damage" from falling shrapnel and that no one was killed or injured.

The Saudi-led coalition fighting Yemen's Houthis said its air defences had intercepted and destroyed two ballistic missiles launched towards Riyadh, and later said two cruise missiles had also been destroyed over the capital and the kingdom's southern region. Saudi civil defence had issued an early warning shortly before the attack, and officials said the building, which also contains residential units, was empty at the time.

Houthis claim the strike

The Houthis claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it caused significant damage. The group also claimed separate strikes on King Khalid International Airport, Aramco oil storage facilities, the Khurais oil field and Pumping Station No. 8 near Dawadmi. Saudi authorities have confirmed none of those claims beyond the damage to the tower.

The strike is part of a sharp escalation in the Houthis' campaign against Saudi Arabia. The group has ramped up attacks on Aramco facilities in recent weeks, including a strike on the company's headquarters in Dhahran in the Eastern Province on October 13, and has declared a maritime embargo on Saudi Arabia since a ceasefire collapsed in July.

A wider war's new front

The attack comes as the Houthis have become another front in the wider US-Israeli war with Iran. The group, which is aligned with Tehran, has repeatedly threatened to hit Aramco offices and installations, and its spokesman warned on Saturday that Saudi Arabia would "pay a heavy price for every crime and act of aggression."

The Houthi-run health ministry in Yemen said a strike near the capital, Sana'a, had killed at least 33 people and wounded 39 others on Saturday, a claim that could not be independently verified.

For now, no oil outage has been reported, and markets will watch for any disruption to Saudi supply. But the damage to one of Riyadh's most recognisable towers — in a district home to banks, international companies and the offices of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund — shows that even a successful interception over a dense city does not end the danger: debris from a destroyed missile can still fall on the very targets the defences exist to protect.