As already commented upon on various occasions on EJIL Talk!, on 5 June 2017 Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt (the ‘quartet’) severed economic and diplomatic ties with Qatar, which included airspace restrictions, maritime restrictions, and travel bans on Qatari nationals. Four years later, the measures have been lifted. This was made possible through…

On 11 June, Qatar initiated proceedings (“Application”) against the United Arab Emirates (“the UAE”) at the International Court of Justice under the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD) and requested provisional measures. This step is yet another episode in the diplomatic standoff that took the world by surprise last year when…

On 23 May, the Qatar News Agency published content attributing statements to Qatar’s Emir which laid bare simmering regional sensitivities and quickly escalated into a full-blown diplomatic row between Qatar and other regional Powers. Indeed, on Monday 5 June, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt adopted what…