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The UAE continues to be a leading example of travel freedom in the Middle East, climbing an impressive 34 positions on the Henley Passport Index over the past decade - and 11 positions in the past year alone.
It now provides its citizens with visa-free access to 140 destinations worldwide and sits in 27th place on the index after gaining entry to China and Ireland earlier this year.
It also recently signed a visa-waiver agreement with Burkina Faso, set to come into effect in the coming months.
"The UAE's meteoric rise is indicative of the country's growing soft power and its viability as a global commercial, economic and travel hub. The nation has been making steady progress with strengthening its diplomatic ties with other countries across the globe, because of which the UAE passport continues to demonstrate its agility and raise the benchmark for other countries in the Middle East. Since 1999, visa restrictions on Emirati citizens have been lifted by some 45 different countries, and we expect the Gulf country to continue its remarkable growth trajectory over the coming months and years," said Marco Gantenbein, Managing Partner of Henley & Partners Middle East and member of the Group Executive Committee.
In the GCC, the UAE passport is the strongest followed by Kuwait (59th ranking), Qatar (61st ranking), and Bahrain (65thranking).
Globally, Japan and Singapore now share 1st place on the 2018 Henley Passport Index, knocking Germany off its perch after five years at the top. Both Asian nations now enjoy visa-free access to a record 180 destinations worldwide, while the German passport provides its citizens with access to 179, meaning it is now the second most powerful globally.
The shift at the top of the index follows Uzbekistan's decision to lift visa requirements for Japanese and Singaporean nationals in early February, among other developments. Uzbekistan's efforts to increase tourist inflows saw a number of other countries in Asia and the Middle East (including Turkey, Indonesia, and Israel) gaining access. In general, both these regions have in recent months seen high levels of visa-policy activity compared with their European and American counterparts, where the signing of new cross-border agreements on short-term travel has been far less frequent.
As a result of these changes, the UK has dropped down one rank to 4th place overall, but the country still provides its citizens with visa-free access to 177 destinations. The Russian Federation, meanwhile, has climbed three places to claim 45thposition. Partly as a result of China's recent visa-waiver agreement with the UAE, the North Asian nation has shown the most growth in its region over the past year, moving up 11 places compared with 2017 and now ranking 74th globally.
The Henley Passport Index is widely acknowledged as the original and most authoritative passport index, with historical data spanning 13 years. The ranking is based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), which maintains the world's largest and most accurate database of travel information, and is enhanced by extensive, ongoing in-house research. The index is updated in real-time, as and when visa-policy changes come into effect. Unlike other passport indexes, which only count countries as destinations, the Henley Passport Index includes both countries and territories in its dataset, making for a more robust and holistic view of global passport power.
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