Women at Doha airport were removed from flights and forced to undergo invasive internal inspection in an ambulance on the tarmac

I don't understand all the people on here swanning around saying "their country their rules". Why are you justifying it?

@SoloMummy normally yes. But not right now to Australia. There are tens of thousands trying to get something like one of the 500 spots a week and only 1-2 choices out of Europe so right now, if you have to get to Australia, there is no choice of transit hub.

@Expat2

As I expected then ..

..the CEO is too concerned with his personal bonus to care.

Ah yes, Airline CEO 101 - never mind the product/service, feel the bonus.

@RufustheSniggeringReindeer
They have chosen to take a flight that lands in that country. Choice. That means they abide by their rules. Very simple. The same as men expecting to walk around the airport shirtless would be challenged. Their rules. Abide or fly via other routes.

I certainly won't entertain ever touching down in the UAE

Stop using them as a hub.

Sadly easier said than done ATM for any Australians trying to get home..hence my comment/question upthread about Qantas.

There are now stuff all airlines serving Australia direct from, example Europe. Qantas/BA and others have pulled the plug. I'm not sure what Singapore is doing now but in the Spring they were close to banning transit flights...so it appears Qatar have pretty much got a monopoly on getting people into Aus from Europe.

@notimagain as an Aussie, I imagine Qantas won’t do anything to help. They are motivated purely by profit and there is no profit in flying a plane with the minuscule numbers the govt insists on. I’m told the only reason some airlines are doing it are to maintain the route. Qantas won’t have that issue and the CEO is too concerned with his personal bonus to care. (I say this as a very high status Qantas FF)

And I completely agree with froggy

Its the most ridiculous thing ive heard saying that ‘transit’ or rerouting through a country means that they have signed up to anything!

It may be a different argument if you are actually on holiday or living in that country...MAY

If airlines like Emirates can't insure the safety of their female passengers in such hubs maybe there should be a campaign not to use them.

Absolutely sickening. Stop using them as a hub. I don’t see why these violations against women and immigrant workers are swept under the carpet for sunny beaches, malls and use of their money.

[quote SoloMummy]@Ginger1982
Ultimately, if you go to a country with a different moral and judicial code, you accept that their rules are what you are subject to.
It's an awful experience for the travellers, but I can't get het up over it. Its their country, their rules.[/quote]
Yeah it's no problem really. The government can make us all drop our pants for a painful internal inspection simply because we're female and travelling on a plane. Fuck that.

Assault really search sounds a bit passive

ME airlines have become much more common and built up a good reputation in last decade. Led by Emirates and Etihad. So many international travellers fly through these hubs.

You just change plages, generally enough time to get off and get back on

I can’t quite recognise any Aus traveller transferring doing this and think it would be someone who is scared of local laws and lives there but I don’t know why they decided to search all the women

"It's an awful experience for the travellers, but I can't get het up over it. Its their country, their rules."

Ok but why are airlines using these hubs? Why are they putting their passengers at risk? Are all the subsidies put into these airports to attract international travel by these oppressive regimes worth the risk to their female passengers?

I’m sure at most a chat in private would suffice

This is the ME, remember. This probably was their idea of a “chat in a private office”

@Ginger1982
Ultimately, if you go to a country with a different moral and judicial code, you accept that their rules are what you are subject to.
It's an awful experience for the travellers, but I can't get het up over it. Its their country, their rules.

" So any person who travels through the Middle East or to Australia has "signed up" to potentially being sexually assaulted, if their flight happens to be re-routed?

Or wait, not person. Any woman. ONLY women.

Men can fly and travel anywhere "

Exactly this. Why are airlines using these countries as hubs? Refuse to fly there.

One for the Aussies..

Any chance this horrific incident issue will put pressure on your Government to facilitate Qantas doing these repatriations?

QF were operating from Europe to Darwin, avoiding a Gulf airport transit, prior to their complete Long Haul shutdown.

Knowing what obvious signs there are generally are for women after giving birth (especially with no medical assistance), I’m amazed that they needed such an intrusive search.

It would be blindingly obvious from looking at the majority of women that they have not just given birth so they should have been eliminated from questioning straightaway - I know there is such thing as concealed pregnancy but afterwards I’m sure at most a chat in private would suffice, at a push a urine test as pp suggested.

I am far more outraged about the treatment of unwed mothers and babies born out of wedlock than a mandatory vaginal inspection for what is a crime in that country.

But don't you see that treating women the way they did the travelling Aussies is a symptom of the same problem as the treatment of unwed mother, namely extreme misogyny?

UsedUpUsername I pray that you don't have children. Being raised by a parent who doesn't understand or possess empathy must be crippling.

(And no one "left a baby to die", since the baby did not in fact die.)

Usually, the embassy helps out with runaway, pregnant maids
She was imprisoned with her baby

You have a funny view of "help". I wonder how bad the abuse of women would need to be before you'd call a government that imprisons women including female slaves for having premarital sex or being rape victims "scumbags."

How could they have dealt with it better?

Any other way would have been better.

Maybe they could have liaised with the Australian Authorities to ask then to check with the women on the list later?

But dragging women out of a plane, subjecting them to barbaric searches and intimate examinations, in a car park, without any information and not a shred of consent is no way of doing it.

The baby's needs don't come into it, even if the mother had been found, it would have made no difference to the baby whatsoever.

This is all very true, but also what someone "signs up to" if they visit, transit through or work in Qatar.

So any person who travels through the Middle East or to Australia has "signed up" to potentially being sexually assaulted, if their flight happens to be re-routed?

Or wait, not person. Any woman. ONLY women.

Men can fly and travel anywhere they like with zero fear of state-sanctioned rape.