Qatar lies about Gulf airspace as it remains off limits

CAIRO- 9 August 2017: The Arab quartet affirmed their commitment on closing their airspace with Doha, denying recent claims that have been circulating about opening their airspace to Qatar Airways as of Tuesday.

Doha newspapers have alleged recently that the Arab countries lifted restrictions on its national carrier and falsified truths related to the late opening of flight corridors for Qatar's state-owned flag carrier Qatar Airways.

The Civil Aviation Authorities in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain continue with the boycott imposed on Qatari flights from using the airspace and airports, while they have granted the use of nine emergency routes for use by Qatari aircraft in coordination with the International Civil Aviation Organization, ICAO, and the neighboring countries.

These routes are considered contingency measures to ensure the safety of international civil aviation in the region.

The Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority is committed to its decision issued on June 5 to prevent Qatari airlines from landing at Egypt's airports or crossing Egypt's sovereign airspace, according to sources in the Ministry of Civil Aviation.

The Bahraini Civil Aviation also stressed in a statement that Qatar’s claim was “not true”, noting that the measures that it had taken, which included the allocation of additional emergency routes in Bahraini airspace, is a measure taken by Bahrain to ensure the safety of air traffic over international waters assigned by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and “does not mean at all that Bahrain has permitted Qatari airspace passing over its sovereign airspace."

Emirati Minister of the Economy Sultan Al Mansoori stated that the airspace closures "have numerous cases of precedent" and that - to date - Qatar has raised no safety issues related to the restrictions.

"Our four states maintain that these airspace closures are a legitimate, justified, and proportionate response to Qatar's actions and are permitted under international law," Al Mansoori added.

The General Authority of Civil Aviation of Saudi Arabia denied Wednesday claims that it allowed Qatari airlines to enter its airspace from the west as “untrue,” according to Sky News.

On Wednesday, ICAO refused Qatar's request to lift restrictions on its national carrier. The ICAO council chairman stressed that the organization focuses only on technical issues and avoids interfering on political issues.

ICAO announced earlier on Tuesday that Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates agreed to open up flight corridors for Qatar’s state-owned flag carrier Qatar Airways.

On June 5, a number of Arab countries, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain, cut all diplomatic and transport ties with Qatar over accusations of funding terrorist groups in the region.

The Arab quartet issued 13 demands to Doha, including closing Al Jazeera television, curbing relations with Iran and shutting down a Turkish military base.