DUBAI, United Arab Emirates —
Dubai International Airport, a major aviation hub, is gearing up to help ease transit
travel for World Cup supporters ahead of the tournament starting in November,
its director said Wednesday.
اضافة اعلان
The first World Cup ever held in a Middle Eastern
country is set to kick off in Qatar on November 20, and will last until
December 18.
Gulf Arab states have agreed to ease administrative
procedures for fans in transit, in particular through the UAE.
“We are actually putting together some immigration
procedures which actually should make that transition between the two countries
a lot easier,” Dubai Airports chief Paul Griffiths told AFP.
He said online check-in will mean normal procedures
can be bypassed “and then you can get in and out very quickly”.
Pre-pandemic,
Dubai was the world’s busiest airport
for international passengers.
Without specifying figures, Griffiths said there
would be “quite a number of flights every day during the World Cup, ferrying
fans to and from Doha”, the Qatari capital, following requests by several
airlines.
He said he also expected many people to “be going
back and forth and enjoy their leisure time in Dubai and going back and forth
just for the matches”.
Flights between the UAE and Qatar resumed in January
last year after a diplomatic reconciliation ended a more than three-year
boycott.
Griffiths also said he was optimistic about Dubai
airport’s prospects.
In the first half of the year, it handled 27.8
million passengers — a rise of more than 160 percent on the same period in
2021, a statement published on Wednesday said.
It said the latest figures
showed traffic during the first half of the year at 67.5 percent of that
pre-pandemic, during the same period in 2019.
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