Qatar-Gulf crisis: All the latest updates

Six months ago, an air, sea and land blockade was imposed on Qatar by neighbouring countries. Here are the latest developments as of Sunday, January 7:

• Muslim scholar held over Qatar tweet. Saudi authorities detained Muslim scholar Salman al-Awda on September 7 and later imposed travel bans on members of Awda's family, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Sunday.

• A family member told HRW that Awda was being held over his refusal to comply with an order by Saudi authorities to tweet a specific text to support the Saudi-led blockade of Qatar.

• Qataris 'barred' from pilgrimage. Saudi Arabia has been accused of preventing Qatari pilgrims from performing the Umrah pilgrimage.

• In its editorial on Thursday, the Al-Raya newspaper said Saudi Arabia has been taking arbitrary measures against Qatari pilgrims visiting Mecca.

• Iran invites to OIC meeting. On Wednesday, Iran's Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani invited Qatar Parliament Speaker Ahmed bin Abdullah al-Mahmoud to attend the 13th summit of the OIC parliament speakers to be held in Tehran on January 17-18, as reported by Iran's news agency (IRNA). 

• Qatar's blockading countries are members in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), but have strained diplomatic relations with Iran. They demanded that Qatar followed suit with Iran.

• All-inclusive participation in GCC meeting. All six member nations will be represented when chief lawmakers from the Gulf region assemble for a conference in Kuwait next week, the country's National Assembly Speaker Marzouq al-Ghanim said on Tuesday. 
• Turkey looks to enhance cooperation. Speaking from Turkey during a promotional event for the turkishsouq.com website, Ahmet Arslad, Turkish minister for transport, maritime affairs said: "Our cooperation with Qatar will not be limited to e-commerce, it will become widespread in other fields and will pave the way for the two countries to work together elsewhere." 

• UAE, Saudi introduce VAT. A common agreement on value-added tax (VAT) for the GCC region will officially come into effect January 1, 2018, with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates announcing actual implementation, Kuwait's News Agency reported on Sunday.

• Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and Oman reportedly decided to delay introducing VAT until later in 2018 and 2019.

For previous developments click here