‘Emir’s visit to Asian nations signals Qatar’s new economic ties despite blockade’

The importance of the visit of Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani to several Asian countries is to build economic relations since it comes in the light of ongoing blockade imposed against Qatar and also it is the continuation of the Emir’s first visit during the siege which included several European countries.
“The Emir’s visit to several Asian countries has an economic dimensions and Qatar’s economy has not been affected by the blockade. The visit signals that Qatar will continue developing new economic partnerships”, said Dr. Khalid bin Mubarak Al-Shafi, Editor-in-Chief of The Peninsula while talking on Qatar TV talk show “The Truth” on Sunday.
For his part, Dr Rabeea Sabah Al Kuwari, an academic and media personnel, said that the visit meant to ensure that Qatar has new economic partners and the blockade didn’t affect it.
Commenting on the two explosions that took place in the Somali capital Mogadishu in which the building of the Embassy of the State of Qatar was also severely damaged and the Qatari charge d’affairs was slightly injured, Dr. Al-Shafi and Al Kuwari said that how can siege countries accuse Qatar of supporting terrorism when the Qatari charge d’affairs was victim to it. How many Al Jazeera journalists killed in many countries because it reports the truth.
“It is not strange if the media of the siege countries report lies against Qatar. Their lies and masks have become known to everyone. They were spreading lies against Qatar and paying to hired-agents to spread their agenda but no one believes them. Qatar welcomes all media outlets not like the siege countries,” said Dr. Al-Shafi.
He added that when the hired agents intensified their abuses against Qatar, they received more gifts and “they are just receiving orders from siege countries”.
Al Kuwari pointed out that the coercive actions taken by the siege countries against citizens who show sympathy with Qatar is an evidence that people don’t believe the siege countries’ media otherwise they needed not executing such oppressive penalties.
Giving an example of failure of siege countries’ media, Al Kuwari said: “We can take the Egyptian media as an example. It receives bribes from others to spread lies against Qatar. It abused Qatar in Unesco but in reality it lost its audience and the Egyptian people don’t believe it”.
“We have benefited from the ongoing blockade. It exposed the country trying to malign Qatar through leveling false allegations of workers rights violations tacitly. Recently we discovered that it was the UAE, which means its media is politically motivated and working on special agenda. Now the UAE is accused of violating the human rights according to reports from different bodies and no one accuses Qatar of such accusations”, he said.
Dr. Al-Shafi noted that the siege countries had tried to hold conferences against Qatar and failed. “Nowadays there is a boycott move is going on in Europe against the UAE, politically and economically. The UAE is facing accusations of killing thousands of innocent people in countries like Libya and Yemen and supported France against Muslims in Mali”.
About the future of Qatar’s relations with the siege countries, Dr. Al-Shafi said that the future relations with the siege countries would be based on respect of Qatar’s sovereignty and on the principle of non-intervention in countries’ internal affairs.
“Also before any dialogue, the siege must be removed. H H the Emir has stated that they must provide evidences and not only allegations if they level accusations against Qatar, ” he maintained.
Dr. Al-Shafi also noted that the United States military cancelled a planned military exercise with some siege countries and were doing joint military exercise with Qatar because “Qatar is a strategic partner of the US”.
On Unesco election and the role played by Egypt, Al Kuwari said: “How can Egypt host the headquarters of the Arab League while the League is like the house of Arab people. Earlier Egypt voted against other Arab countries like Saudi Arabia and Algeria which justifies that Arab League headquarters must be shifted to another country like Tunisia, Kuwait or any other Arab country.”