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This sounds like something out of a movie, but nope, according to Gulf News, the bidding to dig the 60km long, 15-20 meter deep, and 200 meter wide canal ends tomorrow, June 25th. If successfully approved, the Saudis have plans to build a military base, luxurious marina and housing developments, and one area, get this, a nuclear waste facility. Talk about taking tense diplomatic negotiations to the next level…
In case you’d forgotten or were unaware: Last year, select Arab nations (Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt) severed their diplomatic relations with Qatar accusing it of terrorist connections, and have forced aircraft to navigate around any restricted airspace ever since. While negotiations have been ongoing, I’d assume from this news, they aren’t close to agreeing to terms.
According to Gulf News:
Sabq reported that the project would be funded fully by Saudi and UAE private investors and that Egyptian companies with expertise in digging would help with the construction of the canal.
A Saudi military base will be established on part of the one-kilometre side separating the Salwa water way from Qatar, while the remainder will be converted into a waste dump for the Saudi nuclear reactor, which Riyadh plans to build according to best practices and global environmental requirements.
Here are a couple of Twitter screenshots that show what the map would look like.
Do we all believe all of this turmoil is based on terrorism ties? I’m interested in what is happening behind the scenes on this. I mean the U.S. Air Force still has a base in Qatar despite them being “state sponsors of terror.”
Saudi, UAE, Bahrain will return to its roots: desert and desert and desert.
Damn – we need to do this with California and get Mexico to pay for it!
What an interesting thought! 🙂
This is nothing more than propaganda on the Saudi side … they’ve already cut off the land access to and from Qatar as part of their blockade. That being the ONLY Qatari land border, I would think that digging a canal would not make a lot of difference for Qatar, considering they’re not using that border anyways and were able to develop alternate sea and air routes.