Qatar News Week Fri 8th Oct 2021.mov

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Qatar News Weekly Update Edition. A recap of this week’s top stories in Qatar brought to you in conjunction with Marhaba, the number one guide to Qatar.

Starting with last Sunday when the Gulf Times reported that Qatar had made history as Qataris voted in the first ever Shura council elections. Voters trickled in throughout the previous day across various polling stations to elect 30 members of the 45 seat body.

Monday now and good news as Qatar approves new vaccines, and expands its green list for travellers. As part of Qatar’s gradual lifting of COVID-19 restrictions the Ministry of Public Health has updated the countries travel policy and reviewed the country classification related to COVID-19. The new policy came into effect from 2pm Qatar time on Wednesday October the 6th. Fully vaccinated Qatari residents and travellers from green-list countries, will no longer need a PCR test before travelling. Also people who have received Sinopharm, Sinovac and Sputnik 5 vaccines can travel to Qatar but will need a positive serology antibody test. The Ehteraz app can now be activated using an international SIM card. And India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Sudan, Kenya and Indonesia are all on the exceptional Red List.

On to Tuesday and on the Peninsula’s front page, is that an integrated public transport system will be in place by 2022. They also say that Qatar will have two airports ready before the 2022 World Cup.

Wednesday and the Gulf Times leads with the fact that there’s been a sharp rise in the registration of new vehicles along with a huge jump also seen in the issuance of new driving licences. No wonder the roads are so busy.

Onto yesterday now and there’s been a joint meeting held to solve the Doha traffic congestion problem. A joint meeting attended by representatives of the Ministry of Interior the Ministry of Transport and Communications, and the Public Works Authority (Ashghal) was held yesterday to discuss the cause of the current traffic congestion on Doha’s roads.

Also yesterday is the story that visitors and hotel occupancy rates experienced a rise in August. According to the latest report by the Planning and Strategic Authority as many as 62,114 visitors arrived in August this year compared to just 3,019 visitors in the same month last year. Strong growth was visible on a month-on-month basis as 38,289 visitors arrived in Qatar in July showing a growth of 62%. Of the total arrivals 47,925 came into Qatar by air, 13,406 by land, and 783 visitors came in by sea.

Now today’s news and the Ministry of Interior offers expatriates a grace period to correct their residency status. Expatriates can now seek exemption or reduction in fines stemming from violations of residency and family visit rules. The grace period to rectify legal status is from October the 10th to December the 31st 2021.