Egyptians stuck in Qatar lockdown fly home despite blockade
Egyptians stuck in Qatar lockdown fly home despite blockade
Egypt had initially 'refused' to repatriate its citizens stuck in Qatar amid the coronavirus pandemic.
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Qatar has been subjected to a regional blockade for three years [Getty]
Egyptian workers stranded in Qatar in the coronavirus lockdown have flown home, a community group said on Monday, in the first of 18 repatriation flights that have overcome restrictions under a regional boycott.
The flight with 174 passengers on board left late on Sunday via neutral Oman to comply with Cairo's ban on direct air traffic from Qatar, Egyptian media reported.
It marks rare coordination between Doha and Cairo, which is part of a Saudi-led alliance of four Arab countries enforcing an embargo on Qatar.
Riyadh, along with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt, cut diplomatic ties with Doha in June 2017, shut their airspace to Qatari aircraft and severed trade and maritime links with the Gulf country.
They accuse Qatar of supporting radical Islamists and being too close to Iran, charges denied by Doha.
"The first Egyptian evacuation flights took off from Qatar... the rest will come in succession," the Egyptian Association in Doha wrote on its Facebook page alongside an image of passengers on the first leg to Oman.
Read more: Why is Qatar under blockade by Saudi Arabia and its allies?
Once in Muscat the group, who were among 300,000 Egyptians living in Qatar, then switched onto an Egyptian aircraft for the flight to Cairo.
Thousands of Qatar's majority-expatriate workforce have lost their jobs as a result of a downturn caused by coronavirus disruption.
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Many have been unable to travel home on normal commercial flights which have been disrupted as countries have imposed restrictions on arrivals to contain the virus.
India has so far operated 33 special charter flights to repatriate almost 6,000 of its citizens stranded in Qatar, according to Delhi.
The news site of Egypt's state-run Al-Ahram newspaper reported that the 174-strong group had arrived in Cairo with passengers required to quarantine at home for 14 days.
Last week Cairo's emigration ministry said 18 flights would bring back home 3,000 Egyptians stuck in Qatar.
Sunday's flight followed a rare street protest on May 31 by stranded Egyptians brandishing passports outside their country's unoccupied embassy.
As global recession looms, Qatar's energy production, hospitality and aviation have been particularly hard hit, with top employers like Qatar Airways and Qatar Petroleum warning of major redundancies.
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