The US Navy has begun offering financial rewards to anyone who provides information that helps it fight arms and drug smuggling in the Middle East, amid tensions over Iran’s nuclear dossier and Tehran’s arming of the Houthis in Yemen.

Timothy Hawkins, spokesman for the US Fifth Fleet in the Middle East, said that “any destabilizing activity in the region is of interest to the US Navy.”

He explained that “the provision of financial rewards is another step in efforts to strengthen regional maritime security”, stressing that “tremendous progress has been made in the fight against drug and arms trafficking over the past year.”

Hawkins pointed out that “this initiative was launched by the Fifth Fleet last Tuesday as part of the Department of Defense bounty program, which has previously been piloted in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere since the September 11, 2001 attacks.” He stated that “the navy has decided to use the same program while patrolling waterways in the Middle East.”

A military spokesman said: “The program includes opening a hotline in Arabic, English and Farsi, in addition to information that can be sent over the Internet in Dari and Pashto.”

He indicated that “financial rewards could be as high as $100,000 or equivalent in vehicles, boats, or food in exchange for information about any planned attacks against Americans in the region.”

The Fifth Fleet previously announced a “$500 million drug seizure in 2021,” and that same year, the fleet also seized 9,000 weapons, “three times” the amount seized in 2020.

The Ansar Allah movement, the Houthis have not directly responded to the new naval program, but the group’s politburo member Ali al-Kahum explained in a social media statement last week that “the group is monitoring the movements of Americans in the Red Sea, Hadhramout and other areas “. “The options for defense and confrontation are open, and there will be no place and solution for them and their diabolical projects,” he added.