Lebanon dilemma for UAE travellers

The summer holiday plans of hundreds of people may be scuppered after the UAE warned its citizens to stay away from Lebanon.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, alongside its counterparts in Qatar and Bahrain, suggested it was unsafe to travel because of conflict in the north of the country.

Although airlines have stressed that flights remain unaffected, experts warn that many people might reconsider spending the summer in Lebanon.

"What will be affected will be the leisure segment," said Premjit Bangara, travel manager at Sharaf Travel, Dubai. "Lots of people go to Lebanon for summer breaks. That would take a hit."

Shamma Tarish, a 23-year-old Emirati, was planning to travel to Lebanon in coming weeks and stay in a family-owned apartment.

She said she had already bought plane tickets, but is now considering getting a refund. Her family was stranded in Lebanon in 2006 when flights were suspended because of war with Israel, and she has no wish to repeat the experience.

"We already know what it's like to be trapped there. It took us days to get out. As soon as we got the message [about the advisory], we decided we are not going to go through this again. It's a shame that we can't have our holiday."

A spokesman for Etihad Airways said all flights were operating as normal.

A flydubai representative echoed the statement, and added: "We continue to monitor the situation."

A spokesman for Emirates said there had been no disruption to its flights. The airline said travellers who wished to change bookings should contact the local Emirates office.

"It's early days as yet. Airlines wouldn't reduce the number of flights, as it doesn't make financial sense. They would monitor the situation on the ground and, if things get worse, they'd have a temporary suspension of flights," said Mr Bangara.

The UAE issued its travel advisory on Saturday night, after clashes in the northern city of Tripoli between supporters and opponents of the Syrian government.

Issa Abdullah Al-Kalbani, a senior official at the UAE foreign ministry, said Emiratis in Lebanon should contact the embassy in Beirut.

However, an official at the embassy declined to comment when contacted yesterday, saying the embassy was officially closed on Sundays.

The corporate security firm Control Risks, which has offices in Dubai and the UK, has set its risk assessment at medium. "Control Risks is not currently advising evacuation, although a high degree of caution should be exercised in Tripoli, as well as in the Syrian border areas," said Coline Schep, Gulf States and Levant analyst at the company.

Salem, a 27-year-old Emirati whose parents live in Lebanon, said he had no plans to cancel his impending trip in two weeks' time. He said he had been stuck in the country during the 2006 war and the experience was not altogether unpleasant.

"We took a tour of the mountains instead, and we ended up staying," he said. "The weather was better there anyway."

The Lebanese foreign minister, Adnan Mansur, called for Gulf states to review their advisory and said the situation did not warrant a travel warning. In comments to the state news agency NNA, he said that Gulf nationals were "welcome in Lebanon at any time".

Maryam Hersi, an Emirati in Ajman, said she felt the warnings didn't match the situation on the ground.

"I have friends there, and they told me the situation was totally fine," she said. "They said the warnings are a bit over the top, and everything there was normal. They are used to it and they don't see it as a big deal."

mcroucher@thenational.ae

* With reporting by Ola Salem