Qatar: two years of crisis in the Gulf

Agencies
June 3, 2019

Doha, Jun 3: Two years ago Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and their allies cut ties with Qatar, sparking a major diplomatic crisis in the Gulf region.

Here is a recap.

Simmering regional tensions boil over on June 5, 2017, when Saudi Arabia and its allies Bahrain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates announced they are severing diplomatic ties with Qatar.

They accuse it of supporting Islamist movements and seeking closer ties with Riyadh's regional rival Iran -- charges Qatar denies.

The four close land and maritime borders with the Gulf peninsula, suspend air links and expel Qatari citizens.

In a country dependent on food imports, there is alarm over whether the border closures will lead to food shortages in Qatar.

Saudi Arabia also closes the Riyadh bureau of Qatari broadcaster Al Jazeera.

On June 22 the Saudi-led bloc sends Qatar a list of 13 demands which include shutting down Al Jazeera, curbing relations with Iran and closing a Turkish military base it hosts.

Doha on July 4 rejects the demands as "unrealistic".

Saudi Arabia and its allies threaten new sanctions.

On July 25 they unveil a "terrorist" blacklist of 18 groups and individuals suspected of links to Islamist extremists and to Qatar.

The blacklist grows to include almost 90 names.

Seeking support from outside the region and vowing to uphold its sovereignty, Qatar signs a series of defence deals with foreign powers.

They include a December contract with France for a dozen Rafale fighter jets and 50 Airbus A321 passenger planes, and a deal with Britain to buy Typhoon fighters.

It also buys warships from Italy and F-15 fighter jets from the United States.

In January 2018 it approves legislation allowing 100-percent foreign ownership in most sectors of its economy.

Previously reliant on its Gulf neighbours, it increasingly turns towards Iran and Turkey, particularly for food imports.

In April Qatar ruler Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani says "we do not and we will not tolerate people who fund terrorism" during a meeting in the US with President Donald Trump.

Trump calls him "a friend", softening his tone after having supported the Saudi-led bloc and accusing Qatar of funding terrorism.

In June French daily Le Monde reports that Saudi Arabia threatened military action against Qatar if it acquired Russia's top-of-the-range S-400 air defence missile system.

In late June the dispute moves to the UN's top court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, where Qatar accuses the UAE of racial discrimination and human rights abuses against its citizens in the Emirates.

The court orders the UAE in July to protect the rights of its Qatari citizens, including by ending measures that would stop Qatari students from completing their studies.

The UAE in May 2019 accuses Qatar before the ICJ of "aggravating" the two-year-old crisis and of "false accusations".

A day later, Qatar accuses the Emirates of a "campaign of violence and hatred" against its citizens.

The UAE detains for a week a Qatari military ship that had violated its territorial waters.

In May 2019 there is the first high-level contact between the opposing sides in two years when Qatar's Prime Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser Al-Thani attends three regional summits in Saudi Arabia's holy city of Mecca.

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Agencies
July 22,2020

Riyadh, Jul 22: Saudi King Salman held a cabinet meeting via video call from hospital in the capital Riyadh on Tuesday, a day after the 84-year-old monarch was admitted with inflammation of the gall bladder.

Three Saudi sources said the king was in stable condition.

A video of the king chairing the meeting was broadcast on Saudi state TV on Tuesday evening. In the video, which has no sound, King Salman can be seen behind a desk, wordlessly reading and leafing through documents.

The king, who has ruled the world’s largest oil exporter and close US ally since 2015, was undergoing medical checks, state media on Monday cited a Royal Court statement as saying.

Three well-connnected Saudi sources who declined to be identified, two of whom were speaking late on Monday and one on Tuesday, said the king was “fine”.

An official in the region, who requested anonymity, said he spoke to one of King Salman’s sons on Monday who seemed “calm” and that there was no sense of panic about the monarch’s health.

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News Network
February 5,2020

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has said it rejects US President  Donald Trump 's recently unveiled Middle East plan.

The 57-member body, which held a summit on Monday  to discuss the plan in Saudi Arabia's Jeddah, said in a statement that it "calls on all member states not to engage with this plan or to cooperate with the US administration in implementing it in any form".

Requested by the Palestinian leadership, the meeting of the body came two days after the Arab League rejected Trump's so-called "deal of the century", saying: "It does not meet the minimum rights and aspirations of Palestinian people."

Addressing a pro-Israel audience at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by his side, Trump on Tuesday described his long-delayed plan for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a "win-win solution" for both sides.

The US president said his proposed deal would ensure the establishment of a two-state solution, promising Palestinians a state of their own with a new capital in Abu Dis, a suburb just outside Jerusalem. Trump also said Jerusalem would be the "undivided capital" of Israel. The Palestinians want both occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank to be part of a future state.

Palestinian leaders, who were absent during the announcement and had rejected the proposal even before its release, denounced the plan as "a new Balfour Declaration" that heavily favoured Israel and would deny them a viable independent state.

The OIC said in a statement on Twitter on Sunday that its "open-ended executive committee meeting" at the level of foreign ministers would "discuss the organisation's position after the US administration announced its peace plan".

With member states from four continents, the OIC is the second-largest intergovernmental organisation in the world after the United Nations, with a collective population reaching more than 1.8 billion.

The majority of its member states are Muslim-majority countries, while others have significant Muslim populations, including several African and South American countries. While the 22 members of the Arab League are also part of the OIC, the organisation has several significant non-Arab member states, including Turkey, Iran and Pakistan. It also has five observer members, including Russia and Thailand.

Iran 'barred'

Meanwhile, Iran on Monday accused its regional rival Saudi Arabia of blocking its officials from attending the OIC meeting.

"The government of Saudi Arabia has prevented the participation of the Iranian delegation in the meeting to examine the 'deal of the century' plan at the headquarters of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation," Fars news agency quoted Abbas Mousavi, spokesman for Iran's foreign ministry, as saying.

Mousavi said Iran - one of the countries to strongly condemn Trump's plan - had filed a complaint with the OIC and accused its regional rival of misusing its position as the host for the organisation's headquarters.

There was no immediate comment from Saudi officials.

Following the unveiling of Trump's plan, the Saudi foreign ministry expressed appreciation for Trump's efforts and support for direct peace negotiations under Washington's auspices, while state media reported that King Salman had called Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to reassure him of Riyadh's unwavering commitment to the Palestinian cause.

The announcement of Trump's plan drew mixed responses from Arab states.

Observers said the reaction was indicative of the division among Arab countries and their inability to prioritise the Palestinian people's plight over domestic economic agendas and political calculations in relation to the Trump administration.

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News Network
April 29,2020

Dubai, Apr 29: Saudi Arabia reported 1,325 new cases of coronavirus, bringing the total number of infections in the country to 21,402, the Ministry of Health announced on Wednesday (April 28).

Meanwhile, the ministry reported 169 recoveries today, with total recoveries in the kingdom at 2,953. There are 125 cases in intensive care.

The ministry also confirmed 5 deaths, bringing the total number of deaths in the kingdom to 157.

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