The UAE has banned Tunisian Females from boarding UAE aircraft bound to the UAE or transiting at any point in the UAE. No explanation given yet. Numerous Tunisian women stranded at airports after being denied boarding EK flights.

Tunisian Government slapped a ban on Emirates from flying to the country after a number of female passengers were denied boarding its flights.

Tunisia branded UAE’s move as discriminatory and racist, summoning the UAE Ambassador and demanding an explanation for its actions.

Full story: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-42474716

Tunisia just banned EK from flying to TUN. https://www.romandie.com/news/Tunis-sus ... 875782.rom

ME720 wrote:

The UAE has banned Tunisian Females from boarding UAE aircraft bound to the UAE or transiting at any point in the UAE. No explanation given yet. Numerous Tunisian women stranded at airports after being denied boarding EK flights.

Emirates will stop flying between Tunis and Dubai, as instructed by the Tunisian authorities, with effect from 25 December 2017. The good relations between Qatar and Tunisia are undoubtedly the cause.

Next we’ll hear that the UAE deports all Tunisians living in and/ or visiting the UAE.

This is ridiculus.

What a strange decision. If you're going to do something so drastic (like ban women from flying) and claim you have reasoning/intelligence to support the move, then at least share the information with other intelligence agencies...

What inteligence? Banning women of a certain Nationality from boarding aircraft without prior notice? Tunisian women flying through the UAE to Asia were denied boarding.. some of those ladies are stranded at airports .. these are passengers who had paid for those tickets and in possession of the correct travel documents and visa s for the countries they intended to fly to. They must sue and demand compensation. Big money.

nordikcam wrote:

ME720 wrote:

The UAE has banned Tunisian Females from boarding UAE aircraft bound to the UAE or transiting at any point in the UAE. No explanation given yet. Numerous Tunisian women stranded at airports after being denied boarding EK flights.

Emirates will stop flying between Tunis and Dubai, as instructed by the Tunisian authorities, with effect from 25 December 2017. The good relations between Qatar and Tunisia are undoubtedly the cause.

Sure, nothing to do with UAE banning Tunisian females from flying to or transiting UAE.
Honestly if UAE really is banning all females from Tunisia, then I think Tunisians are right to deny landing rights to UAE carriers.

What a weird title. I should add turnesia to my travel list for some day

Shocking, egregious and wholly regressive. These measures are deeply worrying yet wholly unsurprising in today’s topsy turvey world.

I am not in any way condoning this behavior but this could have been handled differently. They could have announced dropping TUN starting next year not immediately, announce their ban on tunisian travellers and at least give compensation and rebook them on other airlines. This is horrible PR and should cause a major media stir. Not a way to fill all the A 380s up.
But how can you put rationale into something that is irrational?

They must have specific security information about Tunisian females to ban them. Maybe intelligence about a female Tunisian live bomb.

My 6th sense tells me it may have something to do with the sex/illegal slave sex trade.... I remember touring the Maghreb region and the girls were VERY negative about the gulf arab behavior towards them "because of local ladies who used to go there in search of work and ended up being recruited to something else"....

They could have increased security and searched everyone ... banning females of a certain nationality? I don t know who is advising them, but this is not good for the (already wobbly )reputation of the UAE, And EK.

Maybe the agents were following protocol, doing there checks. I mean happen all time where celebrity might get held up as well, then they go one twitter insulting TSA or the airlines etc.

Its all due to security reasons. Tunisian women fighting with ISIS has been going back home from Syria and Iraq according to credible sources.
Source: http://gulfnews.com/business/aviation/s ... -1.2146410

dubaiamman243 wrote:

Its all due to security reasons. Tunisian women fighting with ISIS has been going back home from Syria and Iraq according to credible sources.
Source: http://gulfnews.com/business/aviation/s ... -1.2146410

The “official” version. This is just talk. They could have searched people... banning people of a certain nationality is unacceptable! There are political reasons not security. Besides ISIS people usually fly TK via Istanbul not EK. UAE has no land border wth Iraq and Syria .. I understand stringent security but banning all Tunisian females is unheard of.. and should not become the new norm! EK and the UAE must be shamed the way Trump was with his travel bans.

This is nothing. In my 'civilized' country they are banning bottles of water going through customs.

dubaiamman243 wrote:

Its all due to security reasons. Tunisian women fighting with ISIS has been going back home from Syria and Iraq according to credible sources.
Source: http://gulfnews.com/business/aviation/s ... -1.2146410

If it is due to security reasons they need to ban a lot more countries. Same if it is because of the "sex slavery".

This won't affect EK much at all. They were forced to suspend DOH when the Qatar crisis started, and it isn't gonna end anytime soon. EK suspending DOH and Tunis won't affect much.

NichCage wrote:

This won't affect EK much at all. They were forced to suspend DOH when the Qatar crisis started, and it isn't gonna end anytime soon. EK suspending DOH and Tunis won't affect much.

Maybe not financially for EK, but the whole saga is not good for the reputation of the UAE. Along with their war on Yemen etc.

Please stay on topic. Political discussions belong in the Non Aviation Forum.

✈️ atcsundevil

I would hope any airline would act as EK has. "A Tunisian official said UAE authorities had received "serious security information about the possibility of a terrorist attack" by female Tunisian passport holders. A spokeswoman for the Tunisian presidency, Saida Garrach, said that UAE carrier Emirates had received "clear instructions" to deny Tunisian women access to its planes. She said that the information indicated that, with jihadists returning from Syria and Iraq, there was "a possibility of a terrorist attack involving either Tunisian women or women carrying a Tunisian passport". http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-42479368

It really hasn't had much of an effect so far (and it may not ever) but if instability in the Middle East were to somehow continue to get worse, you have to wonder at what magnitude the ME3 and others would be affected.

antskip wrote:

I would hope any airline would act as EK has. "A Tunisian official said UAE authorities had received "serious security information about the possibility of a terrorist attack" by female Tunisian passport holders. A spokeswoman for the Tunisian presidency, Saida Garrach, said that UAE carrier Emirates had received "clear instructions" to deny Tunisian women access to its planes. She said that the information indicated that, with jihadists returning from Syria and Iraq, there was "a possibility of a terrorist attack involving either Tunisian women or women carrying a Tunisian passport". http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-42479368

Until you are Denied boarding for no reason what so ever, we’ll see if you still think that way.

JetBuddy wrote:

This is ridiculus.

I know. It's foolish to piss off one woman. They never forget. Now they've gone out and pissed off all the women in an entire nation in one shot. They're in for a rough ride. Sleeping on the couch, at best.

antskip wrote:

I would hope any airline would act as EK has. "A Tunisian official said UAE authorities had received "serious security information about the possibility of a terrorist attack" by female Tunisian passport holders. A spokeswoman for the Tunisian presidency, Saida Garrach, said that UAE carrier Emirates had received "clear instructions" to deny Tunisian women access to its planes. She said that the information indicated that, with jihadists returning from Syria and Iraq, there was "a possibility of a terrorist attack involving either Tunisian women or women carrying a Tunisian passport". http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-42479368

Am I the only one who finds the explanation strange? In order to ban every Tunisian woman means that they do not have a lot of details on the suspect/s. Also the quote "Tunisian women or women carrying a Tunisian passport" does not show much confidence in the identity of the suspect/s.

If that "woman/women" are indeed capable of such an act what keeps them from changing the "Tunisian passport" to a forged Moroccan/Jordanian or whichever non Tunisian one?

Sth does not add up to me in this story or it has been handled incorrectly.

this has to do with curbing prostitution in the UAE especially during new years celebrations. the ban is temporary.

dz09 wrote:

this has to do with curbing prostitution in the UAE especially during new years celebrations. the ban is temporary.

On that logic alone Emirates/Flydubai should end all
services to Russia and Eastern Europe!

gardermoen wrote:

dz09 wrote:

this has to do with curbing prostitution in the UAE especially during new years celebrations. the ban is temporary.

On that logic alone Emirates/Flydubai should end all
services to Russia and Eastern Europe!

not necessarily, Emiratis and gulf people prefer north Africans, Lebanese and Arab women in general. not sure why that is. The Russians, Asians etc.. are for the expats. Visit dubai or abu dhabi and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

dz09 wrote:

gardermoen wrote:

dz09 wrote:

this has to do with curbing prostitution in the UAE especially during new years celebrations. the ban is temporary.

On that logic alone Emirates/Flydubai should end all
services to Russia and Eastern Europe!

not necessarily, Emiratis and gulf people prefer north Africans, Lebanese and Arab women in general. not sure why that is. The Russians, Asians etc.. are for the expats. Visit dubai or abu dhabi and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

True about what Emiratis prefer, though I don't think EK stopped women cause of that matter. Think has to do more with terrorist thing, that would make more sense. Unless they had proof some women are traffiked or being traffiked.

These Gulf countries and their airlines are so volatile with their decision making...

Ever wondered how Kish Air makes a living? Well, try boarding one of their multiple daily flights to Kish out of Dubai and see for yourself: It's packed with females who are travelling out of country for visa extensions, for which Kish Air offer the cheapest and quickest arrangements. At no point in time are there less than 25.000 prostitutes in Dubai.

Arab males prefer prostitutes of the Muslim conviction, as they consider them to be more 'clean'. Most of them come from Morocco and Tunisia.

It's true-Dubai has a high number of prostitutes/high-class ladies of the night from North Africa, Tunisia and Morocco in particular. However, plenty of women from the former USSR, Ethiopia, East Asia (Philippines, Thailand, even China), India, Bangladesh. Sometimes trafficking/coercion is involved.
Many travel agencies will not process visas for visitors of certain nationalities of certain ages (e.g. Tunisia/Moroccan/Ethiopian below the age of 40 for example) due to high risk of refusal, or they do not want to be blacklisted. However-Dubai has thousands of Tunisians working in other sectors, in the beauty care industry (some hookers will register themselves as hairdressers or manicurists to get the 3-year residence visa, while others are bona fide professionals in that industry), sales, aviation sector etc. It is an insult to introduce a blanket ban at the highest level.
The obvious solution would be to simply make the visa vetting more stringent, if the UAE really desired to clamp down on prostitution-which is an integral part of the Dubai economy.
The UAE probably intercepted some intelligence and someone overreacted.