Cathay Pacific said Thursday it will resume passenger flights to Dubai and Riyadh from Sept. 1, a sign that at least one major airline sees enough stability to begin restoring Middle East service after months of disruption tied to the U.S.-Iran war.
The Hong Kong carrier said it plans daily passenger flights to Dubai and four weekly passenger flights to Riyadh, with Riyadh freighter services restarting Aug. 1. Tickets are already on sale, according to RTHK. Cathay said it will “continue to closely monitor the evolving situation in the Middle East prior to the resumption dates.”
Cathay suspended flights to Dubai and Riyadh at the end of February after the conflict broke out, Channel NewsAsia reported. The airline has also raised fuel surcharges several times as the crisis pushed energy prices higher.
The announcement came after U.S. and Iranian negotiators held separate meetings with Qatari and Pakistani mediators in Doha. Qatar said “positive progress” had been made and that talks would continue after the funeral of Iran’s previous supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, NPR reported through The Associated Press.
U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were in Qatar for talks aimed at a permanent end to the war, while Iran’s top negotiator, Kazem Gharibabadi, met with mediators but not directly with the American side, according to the AP report.
The Strait of Hormuz remains one of the central sticking points. AP reported that Iran and the United States agreed under an interim arrangement to allow ships through without charges for 60 days, while Tehran still insists on controlling routes and later collecting passage fees. The U.S. and several Gulf Arab states oppose those charges.
The airline move does not mean the crisis is over. Cathay’s own statement leaves room for another delay if security conditions deteriorate. But the planned restart is a measurable commercial response to diplomacy holding, even as the talks remain fragile and the Hormuz dispute unresolved.
Sources: Channel NewsAsia, RTHK, NPR/AP.
Image: Cathay Pacific Airbus A350 at Hong Kong International Airport. Credit: GeminiAviation/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.