Paris (France) (AFP) – Evacuation flights are set to rescue tens of thousands of travellers stranded in the Middle East even as some airlines resumed on Tuesday a limited number of scheduled flights. The situation remains dangerous in the region, with Qatar saying it had blocked Iranian attacks on its airport, one of the major hubs in the region. The US and Israeli attacks on Iran, which began on Saturday, followed by Iranian counterattacks on Gulf states and Israel, have prompted several countries to shut their airspace. At least 12,903 flights were cancelled between Saturday and Monday as a result, representing 40 percent of planned flights, according to aviation data analysis firm Cirium. The firm estimates that flights in the region account for around 900,000 seats each day, so the number of affected travellers could easily already be more than one million.
On Sunday, nearly all flights were cancelled out of the United Arab Emirates, home to Dubai airport, the second-largest in the world in terms of passengers. That fell to 93.5 percent on Monday. Dubai and Abu Dhabi’s airport resumed limited operations on Monday. Several Emirates flights took off Tuesday morning, according to the Flightradar24 flight tracking website. The aircraft immediately flew south out of the Gulf region. The vast majority of flights in and out of Dubai remain cancelled. Only some flights by flag carrier Emirates, low-cost flydubai, and Russia’s Aeroflot were operating. Numerous Royal Jordanian flights took off and landed at Amman’s airport, but flew via the south of the country to avoid Israeli airspace. Flights continue to come in and out of Saudi Arabia and Oman, and their airspace is being used by long-haul flights between Europe and Asia. No civilian flights were circulating in the airspace above Iraq, Israel, Kuwait, Libya, or Qatar, however.
Several countries have organised evacuation flights to repatriate their nationals. Two evacuation flights with 200 passengers each landed in the Czech capital Prague on Tuesday morning. “We are preparing to charter flights so that the most vulnerable people…can benefit,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said. He noted that some 400,000 French nationals were located in the dozen countries affected by the conflict. Germany had announced on Monday it would send aircraft to Saudi Arabia and Oman as soon as possible to evacuate the most vulnerable travellers. There are around 30,000 Germans stranded in the region, according to the German Tourism Association.
Travel firm TUI said Tuesday it would begin flying home 5,000 clients stranded on two of its cruise ships in the Gulf via Dubai. Three Indian airlines – IndiGo, Air India Express, and Akasa Air – announced a limited number of evacuation flights to the Middle East. Three flights evacuating Italian nationals were expected to land in Rome and Milan later Tuesday, according to the airports. British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said Tuesday a UK government charter flight would bring home British nationals from Oman in the coming days. British Airways said it had scheduled a flight from Oman on Thursday.
Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said Spain was also organising evacuation flights, and an Etihad flight carrying Spanish nationals was set to land in Madrid on Tuesday evening. The European Union has begun helping member countries Italy, Austria, and Slovakia repatriate their citizens, the bloc’s crisis management chief told AFP Tuesday. Commissioner Hadja Lahbib said the three countries were the first so far to ask Brussels to assist in funding flights from the region.
Airlines including Air France, British Airways, LOT, Norwegian, and SAS have all announced suspensions of flights to the Middle East for the coming days. Finnair has halted flights to Doha and Dubai until nearly the end of the month.
© 2024 AFP
