HH the Emir’s foreign visits during the year played a major role in Qatar’s politics granting the country prosperity in all perspectives, including its partnership agreements with other countries, and issues pertaining the GCC and the region.
During the year, HH the Emir visited Russia, Italy, Bosnia and Herzegovina, France, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Mauritania, Argentine, and Colombia to strengthen bilateral relations and sign agreements for the benefit of Qatar and its counterparts in various fields. In addition, HH the Emir’s determination to the success of the GCC union led to his keenness to visit various GCC states to attend different events, conferences and activities.
On the Darfur peace agreement which was led by Qatar’s mediation, HH the Emir visited the North Darfur to celebrate the successes of ending the war in the province and inaugurating the era of construction and development.
During his opening speech in the United Nations last September HH the Emir presented called on the world to honour its commitments and shoulder responsibilities towards the regional issues without selectivity saying: “It is not possible for us to ignore the weakness of the legal and institutional system of the United Nations and its inability in many situations to apply justice”.
Meanwhile, HE the Prime Minister and Interior Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa al-Thani visited Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, and India to strengthen the ties of friendship between Qatar and its counterparts.
HH the Emir presented the “Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani Anti-Corruption Excellence Award” to its awardees in Vienna this year to appreciate the contribution of entities and personnel towards fighting corruption.
Qatar has hosted many different delegations and public workers from around the world, marked by the historic visit of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud of Saudi Arabia to enhance the relations between the two nations.
In terms of Qatar’s rankings in different fields, it held the 14th place in the latest world competitiveness report (2015-2016) by the World Economic Forum and ranked first in the Middle East in competition with 140 countries worldwide, and the second and 12th rankings in the Middle East and the world respectively in the index of Economic Freedom issued in 2016, and the first in the Middle East for information and communications technology digital economy.
In the infrastructure fields, Qatar achieved high rankings for Hamad International Airport, road infrastructures, marine ports, governmental electronic services, information technology, digital technology, which covered the sectors of sustainability, intelligence and eco-friendliness. All these advances qualified Qatar to consider space and satellite fields where in 2016 it finalised the design of Es’hailSat 2 and planned to launch it in 2017.
All these achievements are supported by the strong foundation of higher education and scientific research which is recognised by major international institutions in the field, by placing Qatar University in the 49th ranking worldwide based on the QS World University Rankings and based on Time Magazine rankings, Qatar University ranked first due to its fast-paced growth where it increased its publications by 246% during the past five years.
This year Qatar also ranked the top among GCC states in terms of the number of tourists visiting the country. It has proved not only a family destination but also a cultural one with the help of Qatar Museums and its enrolment of Al Zubarah Archaeological Site as part of the Unesco World Heritage List. In addition, sports tourism has contributed to the overall growth of tourism led by the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
