The Crisis of the GCC and the Role of the European Union

MENARA Future Notes nº. 14

Most of the international community was caught by surprise on 5 June 2017 when Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt announced that they had cut their diplomatic ties with Qatar and were putting it under an effective embargo. The existence of tensions in the Gulf was well known, but a rupture of this magnitude among the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) was not foreseeable. Nonetheless, a divided Gulf became a lasting reality to which each regional and global power, including the European Union, must accommodate its strategy.