New connections between the Iberian Peninsula and the Gulf

Picture from Wikipedia: Qatar Airways Boeing 777, by Timothy Dauber from Everett, USA - Washington

At the moment there is quite a large number of direct routes between the Iberian Peninsula and America, connecting Barcelona, Madrid and Lisbon to the main cities of that continents (or continents, if you consider North and South America separately), however connections towards the East are very few (Singapore airlines flight to Barcelona and Qatar Airways flight Doha-Madrid being the exceptions), so to fly to the Middle East, Asia or Australia a transfer at other European hubs such as Frankfurt or Paris was required.

From this summer there will be more choice, as we will see the launch of two new scheduled services:

Qatar Airways will start daily flights Barcelona-Doha, whereas Emirates will open its first Spanish routeconnecting Dubai to Madrid. My guess is that the bulk of the traffic would be transfer passengers, as these new routes will significantly reduce journey times from South West Europe to Asia and Oceania.