Qatar dismisses Saudi and UAE’s list of demands as neither reasonable nor actionable

Qatar has been under an illegal blockade by its neighbouring countries Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the UAE since the last two weeks.

The three nations yesterday came out with a list of 13 demands for Qatar which it should accept before the blockade would be lifted. However, Qatar has dismissed it after calling it neither ‘reasonable or actionable.’

“This list of demands confirms what Qatar has said from the beginning — the illegal blockade has nothing to do with combatting terrorism, it’s about limiting Qatar's sovereignty, and outsourcing our foreign policy,” said Sheikh Saif bin Ahmed Al Thani, director of the Qatar government’s communications office, in a statement yesterday.

“The US Secretary of State recently called upon the blockading nations to produce a list of grievances that was ‘reasonable and actionable.’ The British Foreign Secretary asked that the demands be 'measured and realistic.' This list doesn’t satisfy that criteria,” the statement added.

Qatar had said it was reviewing the demands and is preparing an official response after confirming the receipt of a document containing demands from several Arab countries that cut ties.

Qatar News Agency had reported that the list was received by Qatar’s ministry of foreign affairs on June 22.

“The state of Qatar is currently studying this paper, the demands contained therein and the foundations on which they were based, in order to prepare an appropriate response to it and hand it over to the state of Kuwait,” QNA said, citing a statement by the ministry of foreign affairs.

Earlier, Qatar’s Foreign Minister HE Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani had said that there can’t be talk about complaints or accusations by the countries that imposed the siege on Qatar until these countries explain the problem, reported Qatar Tribune.

He said before discussing the demands, there must be a discussion first of the real reasons behind the measures taken against Qatar and the evidence on which these measures were based.

The Saudi-led bloc has given Qatar 10 days to comply with 13 demands, which included shutting down the Al Jazeera Media Network, closing a Turkish military base and scaling down ties with Iran.

The document had also demanded an unspecified amount as compensation and consent to monthly compliance audits in the first year, followed by quarterly audits in the second year, and annual audits in the following 10 years.

Meanwhile, the Qatar National Human Rights Committee (NHRC) called on Qatar not to accept the list of demands, stating it contains conditions that violate human rights conventions and other international and regional agreements.

“By accepting those demands and conditions Qatar will be subject to international accountability and violating its commitments regarding human rights conventions,” NHRC said in a statement.

The committee stated that some of the conditions in the list of demands amount to gross violations of human rights, such as the right to freedom of opinion and expression, the right to nationality, and the right to asylum.

The NHRC also called for an immediate and unconditional lifting of the blockade against Qatar.