The United Arab Emirates has spread a ‘climate of fear’ among Qataris living in the country during the year-long blockade, splitting families and causing ‘substantial pain,’ the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has heard.

As the bitter Gulf crisis moves to the world tribunals, Doha is appealing to the ICJ in The Hague to order emergency measures to lift restrictions imposed on Qataris in June 2017 by Abu Dhabi, reported Gulf Times.

“Many Qataris still resident in the UAE live in perpetual fear, they live in the shadow of the UAE’s expulsion order,” leading British barrister Lord Peter Goldsmith, acting for Doha, told the court.

The illegal blockade, which began on June 5, has seen punitive measures being implemented including banning Qatar Airways from their airspace and closing the country’s only land border with Saudi Arabia.

The Gulf states also ordered Qataris to leave within 14 days as well as calling home their own citizens.

Goldsmith told ICJ judges on the third and final day of hearings that helplines the UAE set up to help Qataris understand the restrictions were in fact linked to the Abu Dhabi police, according to The Peninsula.

So Qataris are “too scared to call hotlines to register their presence or their families’ presence for fear of reprisals.”

Goldsmith also contended that every proposed “trip to the UAE by a Qatari requires a separate approval no matter the circumstances.”

One Qatari woman, for example, who has to make trips to Lebanon at intervals for regular medical treatment in Beirut, risks being unable to return to her family in the UAE every time she leaves for Lebanon.

Qatari students at UAE universities were also sent emails telling they had been withdrawn. Many have since dropped out of their higher education courses, reported Qatar Tribune.

Concerns raised over the past months by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have shown ‘compelling evidence of what has happened, with substantial pain inflicted,’ Goldsmith argued.

Doha has appealed for emergency measures from the court to order the UAE to “immediately cease and desist from any violations of the human rights of Qataris,” said Qatar’s agent Mohammed Abdulaziz Al Khulaifi.

The judges will now have to consider their decision which could several weeks or even months.