It’s a significant moment in the Middle East, as the Arab nations that had blockaded Qatar for more than three years agreed to lift the boycott against the country, and restore diplomatic relations.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt will reopen airspace to Qatar following a 3.5-year illegal ban, and all of the countries will restore full diplomatic relations with Qatar. Overflight above those nations is set to resume for Qatari jets — but at the time of writing this column, we are still waiting for NOTAMs to reflect the lifting of the airspace ban (a NOTAM is a “notice to airmen” — essentially a policy notice to pilots issued by country aviation authorities and airports regarding airspace access and other key information).
Saudi’s foreign minister confirmed “diplomatic relations between Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt and Qatar will be restored” following lifting of the embargo on Qatar. This major shift in the Middle East is happening just days before US president-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris are sworn into office. Biden has already warned he will challenge Saudi Arabia over its human rights record and its war in Yemen.
In June 2017, Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt each imposed airspace bans on Qatari jets as part of the wider blockade — a violation of their signed ICAO airspace treaties. Last year, ICJ — the highest court in the world — ruled in favour of Qatar in Gulf airspace blockade. By ruling in favour of Qatar, the ICJ rejected the appeal by these states, and the ruling itself was the most significant development in the air blockade, but still, the ban remained.
For Qatar, Saudi airspace access for overflight is the most crucial of all states involved in the rift. The blockade forced lengthy detours around Saudi Arabia, increasing commercial flight times, especially on routes between Doha and Africa, and South America, inconveniencing passengers and preventing an efficient flow of goods, cargo and pharmaceuticals.
While we await further details of the agreement, Al Jazeera’s Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from Doha, said it was unlikely many details regarding what led to the breakthrough will be made public. “What was clear from the language chosen by the Saudi foreign minister and the GCC Secretary-General was that they wanted to gloss over the details and described it as all parties being content,” he said, adding that the focus was more on the “unity all the GCC countries have reaffirmed.”
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman met Qatar’s Amir His Highness Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani separately and reviewed bilateral ties between the two “brotherly” countries, and ways of enforcing joint Gulf action, the Saudi state news agency reported.
The pair publicly embraced at the airport when His Highness Qatar’s Amir arrived for the summit.
Leaders of the six-member GCC signed two documents on Tuesday, the Al-Ula declaration, named after the Saudi city, where this year’s regional summit was held, and a final communique.
The blockade, for the first time, put a spotlight on the distribution of so-called "airspace" in the Gulf region, with many questionings how Qatar could have so little of it.
Sovereign airspace by international law corresponds with the maritime definition of territorial waters as being 12 nautical miles out from a nation's coastline. Airspace not within any country's territorial limit is considered international. When most people refer to "airspace", they're more often describing a "flight information region" shape (FIR).
Bahrain has a disproportionally vast amount of airspace, which previously was never considered a potential threat to Gulf airspace stability.
When Bahrain and Qatar gained their independence from the UK in 1971, there was no change to the FIR shapes in the region, which had previously been determined according to where radars had initially been installed. It was maintained this way as a matter of administrative convenience, and seen as the better option, over equally distributing FIR's to each state, which would require flight crew to speak to four different air traffic controllers within the space of around 20 minutes.
With a history of good relations between Qatar and Bahrain, and both being signatory members of International Civil Aviation Organisation's (ICAO — UN body for Aviation) Transit Agreement, Bahrain (along with signatory states the UAE and Egypt) had committed under the agreement to permit scheduled flights from the state of Qatar to overfly their airspace.
As part of the new deal to repair relations between these Arab nations and Qatar, The Washington Post, citing a person with knowledge of the agreement, reported that Saudi Arabia and its allies dropped the list of 13 demands. Qatar then agreed to freeze a litany of lawsuits against the blockading states, said the person who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
For now, the region will closely monitor developments concerning exactly how relations are restored, specifically with regards to airspace access, and eventually: flights between Qatar and Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt.
* The author is an aviation analyst. Twitter handle: @AlexInAir
Saudi’s foreign minister confirmed “diplomatic relations between Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt and Qatar will be restored” following lifting of the embargo on Qatar. This major shift in the Middle East is happening just days before US president-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris are sworn into office. Biden has already warned he will challenge Saudi Arabia over its human rights record and its war in Yemen.
In June 2017, Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt each imposed airspace bans on Qatari jets as part of the wider blockade — a violation of their signed ICAO airspace treaties. Last year, ICJ — the highest court in the world — ruled in favour of Qatar in Gulf airspace blockade. By ruling in favour of Qatar, the ICJ rejected the appeal by these states, and the ruling itself was the most significant development in the air blockade, but still, the ban remained.
For Qatar, Saudi airspace access for overflight is the most crucial of all states involved in the rift. The blockade forced lengthy detours around Saudi Arabia, increasing commercial flight times, especially on routes between Doha and Africa, and South America, inconveniencing passengers and preventing an efficient flow of goods, cargo and pharmaceuticals.
While we await further details of the agreement, Al Jazeera’s Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from Doha, said it was unlikely many details regarding what led to the breakthrough will be made public. “What was clear from the language chosen by the Saudi foreign minister and the GCC Secretary-General was that they wanted to gloss over the details and described it as all parties being content,” he said, adding that the focus was more on the “unity all the GCC countries have reaffirmed.”
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman met Qatar’s Amir His Highness Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani separately and reviewed bilateral ties between the two “brotherly” countries, and ways of enforcing joint Gulf action, the Saudi state news agency reported.
The pair publicly embraced at the airport when His Highness Qatar’s Amir arrived for the summit.
Leaders of the six-member GCC signed two documents on Tuesday, the Al-Ula declaration, named after the Saudi city, where this year’s regional summit was held, and a final communique.
The blockade, for the first time, put a spotlight on the distribution of so-called "airspace" in the Gulf region, with many questionings how Qatar could have so little of it.
Sovereign airspace by international law corresponds with the maritime definition of territorial waters as being 12 nautical miles out from a nation's coastline. Airspace not within any country's territorial limit is considered international. When most people refer to "airspace", they're more often describing a "flight information region" shape (FIR).
Bahrain has a disproportionally vast amount of airspace, which previously was never considered a potential threat to Gulf airspace stability.
When Bahrain and Qatar gained their independence from the UK in 1971, there was no change to the FIR shapes in the region, which had previously been determined according to where radars had initially been installed. It was maintained this way as a matter of administrative convenience, and seen as the better option, over equally distributing FIR's to each state, which would require flight crew to speak to four different air traffic controllers within the space of around 20 minutes.
With a history of good relations between Qatar and Bahrain, and both being signatory members of International Civil Aviation Organisation's (ICAO — UN body for Aviation) Transit Agreement, Bahrain (along with signatory states the UAE and Egypt) had committed under the agreement to permit scheduled flights from the state of Qatar to overfly their airspace.
As part of the new deal to repair relations between these Arab nations and Qatar, The Washington Post, citing a person with knowledge of the agreement, reported that Saudi Arabia and its allies dropped the list of 13 demands. Qatar then agreed to freeze a litany of lawsuits against the blockading states, said the person who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
For now, the region will closely monitor developments concerning exactly how relations are restored, specifically with regards to airspace access, and eventually: flights between Qatar and Saudi, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt.
* The author is an aviation analyst. Twitter handle: @AlexInAir
