Aviation securityYemen may impose 100% air freight screening
In the wake of explosives being shipped from Yemen to the U.S. on 29 October, Yemeni authorities are stepping up efforts to boost security; one measure likely to be adopted is 100 percent air freight screening; government officials warn that tighter screening alone is not the answer; Qatar Airways confirmed it moved one of the packages from Yemen, via its Doha hub, to Dubai, where the explosive device was discovered; the airline CEO, Akbar Al Baker, stresses, however, that it was not the airline’s responsibility, but that of authorities. to conduct the searches
Cargo aircraft at Cologne-Bonn airport // Source: washtimes.com
In the wake of explosives being shipped from Yemen to the U.S. on 29 October, Yemeni authorities are stepping up efforts to boost security. One measure likely to be adopted is 100 percent air freight screening, says Mohamed Abdul Kader, deputy chairman of Yemen’s civil aviation authority. A study is currently underway on what measures to adopt more widely, he notes.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Doha Aviation Summit, the civil aviation authorities from other Gulf states vowed to work with Yemen and provide any assistance requested. None of them have adopted the U.S. ban on accepting air freight from Yemen.
Robert Wall writes in Aviation Week that government officials warn that tighter screening alone is not the answer. “Intelligence sharing is much more important than screening” argues Abdulrahman Mohamed Al Gaoud, Bahrain’s undersecretary for civil aviation affairs. “Screening is effective, but it is not the only means” to deal with the situation, he says.
This is echoed by Saif Mohammed Al Suwaidi, the director general of the United Arab Emirates civil aviation authority, who notes it was intelligence that allowed authorities in his country stop one package before it was shipped on to the United States. “Cooperation now is really at a high level,” he says, adding he is confident practices now in place will catch any further packages.
Meanwhile, Qatar Airways confirmed it moved one of the packages from Yemen, via its Doha hub, to Dubai, where the explosive device was discovered. The airline CEO, Akbar Al Baker, stresses, however, that it was not the airline’s responsibility, but that of authorities to conduct the searches.
In a statement, the airline says “it is not the responsibility of the country in which the cargo transits to x-ray or inspect the cargo. This responsibility belongs to the country from where the consignment originates. Furthermore, the explosives discovered were of a sophisticated nature whereby they could not be detected by x-ray screening or trained sniffer dogs. The explosives were only discovered after an intelligence tip-off.”
