Manama: Traffic systems will soon be linked across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, security officers have said.
A technical team will oversee the implementation of the link that will be used as a core for other services aiming to reinforce cooperation between the member countries, the heads of traffic said as they convened in the Saudi Red Sea city of Jeddah for their 30th meeting.
The GCC is made up of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
“The UAE had proposed the link between the traffic systems in the GCC and it has been approved by all members,” Ghaith Hassan Al Zoabi, the head of the UAE delegation, said. “The first phase is to link the traffic systems to be followed by a link for the fines across the GCC countries,” he said, quoted by Saudi daily Al Eqtisadiya on Tuesday.
Traffic authorities in the UAE last year reported a deficit of millions annually with thousands of GCC motorists failing to pay their fines before leaving the country.
The steady increase in the number of GCC-registered vehicles entering the UAE could compound the situation if no appropriate measures were taken to address the unpaid fines, they said.
Qatar last year pushed for barring GCC vehicles from leaving the country until their drivers, mainly from neighbouring Saudi Arabia, paid the fines imposed mainly for exceeding speed limits.
Officers at the meeting said that measures adopted by the GCC to share services for Gulf nationals included the possibility to renew the driving licence, drop the vehicle, inspect it and sell it in any of the six member states.
The meeting said that the GCC traffic officials were also working on increasing awareness about the different types of violations in each of the member countries.
GCC drivers often complained that they did not deliberately break traffic rules and that they were not aware of the systems applied in some GCC countries, such as Salik in the UAE and Saher in Saudi Arabia.
