KLM cancels Dubai flights until March 28 amid Middle East tensions

KLM halts Dubai services until March 28 while monitoring security situation

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File photo of KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
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Dubai: Dutch carrier KLM Royal Dutch Airlines has cancelled all flights to Dubai until March 28 due to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

The airline said passengers booked on the affected services will be contacted and can either rebook their tickets free of charge or request a refund through the airline’s My Trip service.

“Due to ongoing unrest in the Middle East, KLM has decided to cancel all flights to Dubai up to and including March 28,” the airline said.

Safety considerations remain the main factor behind the decision.

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“The safety of our passengers and crew is always our top priority,” KLM said, adding that it understands the impact the cancellations may have on travellers and is working to keep them informed.

Flights to other destinations in the region have also been affected. KLM confirmed that services to Riyadh and Dammam will not operate up to and including March 12.

“Due to ongoing unrest in the Middle East, KLM will also not be flying to Riyadh and Dammam up to and including Thursday, March 12. We are closely monitoring the situation,” the airline said.

The carrier said it remains in contact with authorities while monitoring developments across the region.

“We continue to closely monitor the situation and remain in contact with the relevant authorities. As soon as there is any new information regarding the resumption of flights, we will inform our passengers immediately,” the airline said.

KLM also said it remains available to assist with the repatriation of stranded travellers in coordination with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Nivetha Dayanand is Assistant Business Editor at Gulf News, covering aviation, financial markets and commodities. A business and financial journalist with a strong interest in multimedia storytelling, she regularly takes complex financial and economic subjects beyond the written word, producing explainer videos that make them easier for a wider audience to understand. Nivetha has interviewed senior policymakers, business leaders and global financial figures both on and off camera. Her past guests include UAE Minister of Economy and Tourism Abdulla bin Touq Al Marri, Khaled bin Alwaleed Al Saud, a member of the House of Saud and the founder and CEO of KBW Ventures, Jihad Azour, Director of the Middle East and Central Asia Department at the International Monetary Fund and Indian ministers Hardeep Singh Puri and N. Chandrababu Naidu. She has also hosted and moderated panels, conferences and awards shows, bringing her newsroom experience to live conversations on business, finance and the economy. An Erasmus Mundus journalism alum, Nivetha is drawn to stories that affect people directly and to reporting that gives a platform to voices that might otherwise go unheard. She was among the first journalists to speak to Petrofac employees in the UAE about unpaid salaries, broke the news of the planned demolition of Dubai’s well-known “Toyota Building”, and helped set the record straight on widely circulated claims that a giant replica of the Moon was coming to Dubai. More recently, her exclusive interview with EDGE Group CEO Hamad Al Marar revealed how the UAE-based defence group deployed its systems along the country’s shore border and established a geofence around the UAE within 48 hours of the February 28 escalation. Prior to joining Gulf News, Nivetha worked at ITP Media, where she helped launch Finance Middle East, a new publication covering the region’s financial sector. Her role spanned reporting and editing, video production, interviews and events. Across print, digital, and video, she focuses on finding the people behind business stories and explaining why those stories matter to the audience reading or watching them.

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