Border Control (Saudi Arabia issues demands to Qatar)

[stui magpie]

Isn't just the province of the west.

Interesting developments in the middle east, Qatar has effectively been isolated. The surrounding countries, including Bahrain, UAE and Saudi Arabia have closed their borders to Qatar.

Citizens of Qatar have been given 2 weeks to get out of the other countries, citizens of their countries aren't allowed to travel o Qatar, and airspace has been closed to them which will have a serious impact on their airline and economy.

The notional reason for this is Qatar's links with Terrorist organisations. The cynic in me says there's something other agenda at play.

Interesting that when western countries talk about restricting immigration from countries with a propensity to produce Islamic terrorists, the world loses it's collective mind, yet when majority Muslim countries take it to a new extreme, not a murmur.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-40168856

[Mountains Magpie]

Yes Stui, I mentioned this yesterday, on page 75 of the terror attacks thread.

Further coverage here:

http://www.middleeasteye.net

MM

[stui magpie]

Sorry MM, I missed it.

[Mountains Magpie]

All good It's a pretty busy thread!!

That middleeasteye site is worth a look, if only for another perspective.

[stui magpie]

Cheers, it is interesting.

Qatar is Trumps fault?

[Tannin]

I was very worried about the third Qatar but after Treloar's great goal in the final Qatar I knew that we'd be OK.

[HAL]

OK. Where were you worried about the third Qatar but after Treloar's great goal in the final Qatar he or she knew that we'd be?

[ronrat]

All those crooks at FIFA who took bribes to allow Qatar to host the world cup will be careful about when they spend the money. It could well be that spots will be won by countries who are won't allow athletes to go. Time for a revisit I think and all delegates in the original vote banned from voting.

[Mountains Magpie]

An article from the UAE dated 30 May:

http://m.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/qatars-troubles-are-rooted-in-its-support-for-islamists

MM

PS: Everything is Trump's fault. I'll try to figure out why you didn't get the memo

[Mugwump]

[David]

I'm as surprised by this as anybody, particularly given that I always saw Qatar as a client state of the US and very much in the same camp as the rest of the pro-Saudi, anti-Iran gulf bloc – but it seems these tensions have been bubbling away for a while now, and most of it comes down to their support of the Muslim Brotherhood.

That's a tricky issue that may be more complicated than how it's sometimes represented. As far as I'm aware, the Muslim Brotherhood are not actually a Jihadist/terrorist organisation but rather a 'moderate' Islamist one – which is to say, they are at least ostensibly pro-democracy and anti-violence while still seeking the imposition of Sharia Law. Certain sections of the Arab world consider them terrorists though, most notably in Egypt where the military junta has designated them enemy number one (primarily, as far as I can tell, because the Muslim Brotherhood won the first free election there after the Arab Spring). So there's a lot of politics going on here that we might not immediately be aware of.

[HAL]

Not much more.

[Mountains Magpie]

An article on the muslim brotherhood from earlier this year:

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/02/cia-memo-designating-muslim-brotherhood-could-fuel-extremism-214757

Been around for 90 years I thought it was about 60.

MM

[Culprit]

Two good things will come from this:

1 - Cheap Oil as Qatar will need the $$$
2 - The World Cup will be in Australia as no one will be able to get to Qatar.

[Mountains Magpie]