Saudi Arabia and Qatar on Monday signed a deal to construct a high-speed rail connecting the Gulf countries\u2019 capitals, marking the latest sign of improved ties between the two nations that were once deeply at odds.<\/p>\n
According to a statement in the official Saudi press, the \u201chigh-speed electric passenger railway\u201d would connect Riyadh and Doha. The Saudi cities of Al-Hofuf and Dammam are also expected to be on the network.<\/p>\n
The train would reach speeds exceeding 300 kilometres per hour and the trip would take roughly two hours between the two capitals. A direct flight between the cities clocks in at around 90 minutes.<\/p>\n
The project, set to be completed in six years, expects to serve 10 million passengers per year, the statement said.<\/p>\n
The agreement was signed by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Qatar\u2019s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani during the latter\u2019s visit to Riyadh.<\/p>\n
The deal is just the latest in a series of moves marking the dramatic improvement in ties between the Gulf countries in recent years.<\/p>\n
Saudi Arabia and its allies, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt, had cut all diplomatic and transport ties with Qatar in June 2017.<\/p>\n
The four nations accused Doha of backing radical extremists and seeking closer ties with Saudi Arabia\u2019s arch-rival Tehran \u2014 allegations that Qatar vehemently denied.<\/p>\n
Relations were fully restored in January 2021 after a summit in the Saudi desert city of Al Ula.<\/p>\n
Prince Mohammed visited Doha in December 2021 for the first time since the thaw in ties, as part of a regional Gulf tour.<\/p>\n
Since then, leaders from the two monarchies have met regularly and joined forces to back diplomatic initiatives, including calls for a ceasefire in Gaza. Riyadh also threw its support behind Qatar following Israeli strikes on Doha over the summer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Saudi Arabia and Qatar on Monday signed a deal to construct a high-speed rail connecting the Gulf countries\u2019 capitals, marking the latest sign of improved ties between the two nations that were once deeply at odds. According to a statement in the official Saudi press, the \u201chigh-speed electric passenger railway\u201d would connect Riyadh and Doha. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13971"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13973,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13971\/revisions\/13973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}