Qatar sanctions begin to bite; banks, terror groups face heat
I personally don’t think we are following a policy that aims at escalation. The objective, as I see it, is to evaluate and put out the flames that target the region. Dr Anwar Gargash UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs @AnwarGargash
abu dhabi — Banks and other financial institutions operating in the UAE have been instructed to freeze any accounts or deposits or investments held by individuals or entities designated as terrorists or terrorist organisations.
The UAE Central Bank also advised banks and other financial institutions operating in the country to apply enhanced customer due diligence for any accounts they hold belonging to six Qatari banks.
A bank press statement said two circulars were issued based on UAE Cabinet Resolution 18/2017 designating 59 individuals and 12 entities as terrorists or terrorist organisations.
At the same time, a number of financial institutions based in Qatar that hold accounts of these sanctioned individuals and entities have been identified. Those banks are: Qatar Islamic Bank; Qatar International Islamic Bank; Barwa Bank; Masraf Al Rayan; Qatar National Bank and Doha Bank.
These actions follow the decision by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE and Bahrain, as part of their unified and ongoing commitment to combatting terrorism. They will update their respective lists of designated terrorist organisations and individuals to include the 59 individuals and 12 entities in each of their four jurisdictions.
The UAE, Bahrain, Egypt and Saudi Arabia said they sanctioned the groups and individuals because of “the continuous and ongoing violations of the authorities in Doha of Qatar’s commitments and obligations.”
Six of the organisations are already considered militant groups in Bahrain, home to the US Navy’s 5th Fleet and an under-construction British naval base.
doha — Arab countries put 12 organisations and 59 people on a terror sanctions list early on Friday they described as being associated with Qatar, the latest in a growing diplomatic dispute that’s seen the energy rich nation isolated by Saudi Arabia and others.
Qatar dismissed the terror listing as part of “baseless allegations that hold no foundation in fact”, standing by earlier defiant statements by its top diplomat that Arab nations had no “right to blockade my country”.
The sanctions list further tightens the screws on Qatar, home to a major US military base and the host of the 2022 Fifa World Cup, and shows the crisis only escalating despite Kuwaiti efforts to mediate an end to the rift.
Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates said they sanctioned the groups and individuals because of “the continuous and ongoing violations of the authorities in Doha of Qatar’s commitments and obligations”.
Six of the organisations are already considered militant groups in Bahrain. Among the individuals named is Youssef Al Qaradawi, an Egyptian-born cleric considered a spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. Al Qaradawi has been tried and sentenced to death in absentia in Egypt since the 2013 military overthrow of president Mohammed Mursi, a Brotherhood member.
Other names involving Egypt include more Brotherhood members and those once belonging to Gamaa Islamiya, a militant group that carried out a series of bloody attacks in Egypt in the 1990s before renouncing violence in 2000s. One is the brother of the Gamaa Islamiya assassin who killed Egyptian leader Anwar Sadat in 1981.
Egypt separately has asked the United Nations Security Council to investigate reports that Qatar “paid up to $1 billion to a terrorist group active in Iraq” to recently free 26 hostages, including members of its ruling family, saying it would violate UN sanctions.
Names involving Libya include militia commanders and the Benghazi Defence Brigade, which is battling forces commanded by Gen. Khalifa Hifter. The sole Yemeni, Abdel Wahab Al Humayqani, is the leader of a party whose has been accused by the US of financing Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the terror group’s branch in Yemen.
Qatar long has denied supporting or funding terror groups. However, Western diplomats accuse Qatar’s government of allowing or even encouraging the funding of some extremists, like Al Qaeda’s branch in Syria.
Responding to the list overnight, Qatar issued a statement saying: “We do not, have not and will not support terrorist groups.”
“We lead the region in attacking the roots of terrorism — by giving young people hope through jobs, replacing weapons with pens by educating hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees and funding local community programmes globally to challenge extremist agendas,” it said.
In a wide-ranging interview on Thursday, Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani repeatedly denied that his country funded extremists and he rejected the idea of shutting down its Al Jazeera satellite news network, something suggested as a demand of the Arab nations.
He said Qatar, as an independent nation, also had the right to support groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, despite the fact that its neighbours view it as a threat to their rule.
“If anyone thinks they are going to impose anything on my internal affairs or my internal issues, this is not going to happen,” the Qatari foreign minister said.
Worried residents have responded to the crisis by emptying grocery stores in the capital of Doha, and Saudi Arabia has blocked trucks carrying food from entering the country across its only land border.
Doha is a major international travel hub, but flagship carrier Qatar Airways now flies increasingly over Iran and Turkey after being blocked elsewhere in the Middle East.
Once again we call for reason and wisdom to prevail, shun obstinacy and stubbornness, as escalation is of no use. The way out for the brother (Qatar) is that it must pursue a new, transparent and credible approach.