Turkey to send 11 tons of aid to Qatar

ISTANBUL - Anadolu Agency

Turkey will continue to help Qatar and is planning to send the Gulf country another aid ship carrying 11 tons of humanitarian aid, the Turkish Economy Minister said June 19.      
  
“A ship carrying 4,000 tons of aid is going to Qatar right now, and then another ship carrying 11 tons of aid will also be sent,” Nihat Zeybekci said at an iftar event in Istanbul.  
      
 “They [Qatar] particularly wanted from us milk products and eggs, and we’ve sent 90 planes [loaded with aid] and met all their needs,” he said.      
 
On June 5, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Yemen abruptly cut diplomatic relations with Qatar, accusing Doha of supporting terrorism without presenting any evidence to support their claims.        

Mauritania followed suit shortly afterward, while Jordan downgraded its diplomatic relations with Doha and closed the local office of Qatar’s Al Jazeera satellite news channel.  
    
 Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain also closed their air space to Qatari aircraft and gave Qatari diplomats 48 hours to leave their respective countries.      
  
Saudi Arabia has also sealed its land border with Qatar, geographically isolating the small Gulf peninsula.    
   
Other countries to have recently cut diplomatic ties with Qatar include the Maldives and the Comoros Islands, along with Libya’s Tobruk-based government, which supports putschist General Khalifa Haftar and lacks international recognition.        

Qatar denies all accusations that it is a supporter of terrorism, describing moves to isolate it by its fellow Arab countries as “unjustified.”