Middle East War: What Hong Kong Travellers Must Know Now

If you have a flight booked in the coming weeks, today’s news should give you pause — and prompt you to open your travel insurance policy.

Cathay Pacific announced this morning that it is raising fuel surcharges after jet fuel costs doubled in March following the outbreak of war in the Middle East. Hong Kong Airlines confirmed its own surcharge increases across most routes from Thursday. Across Asia, airlines are warning passengers that ticket prices and surcharge levels are subject to further change as the conflict continues to drive oil prices upward.

For Hong Kong travellers, the implications go well beyond higher fares.

Suspended Routes and the Domino Effect on Your Plans

Cathay Pacific has already suspended all March flights to Dubai and Riyadh, extending suspensions that began earlier this month. If you had flights booked through a Middle Eastern hub, your itinerary may already have changed — or could change with very little notice. The airline has added extra Europe flights in response to surging demand from passengers seeking alternative routing, but rerouted journeys mean longer travel times, missed connections, and in some cases, significantly altered arrival dates.

This is exactly the kind of scenario where travel insurance either saves you or leaves you stranded — depending on how your policy is written.

What Your Travel Insurance May (and May Not) Cover

Trip cancellation and curtailment policies typically cover you if your carrier cancels a flight entirely. However, rescheduling or rerouting — where the airline still gets you to your destination, just differently — often does not trigger a cancellation payout. Read the exact language in your policy carefully.

Travel delay cover kicks in when your departure is delayed past a stated threshold (commonly four or six hours). If your airline substitutes a longer routing, some policies count this as a delay from the original scheduled arrival; others do not.

Force majeure clauses are the critical grey area right now. Many policies exclude losses caused by acts of war or armed conflict. However, the way these clauses apply depends heavily on the specific wording and which insurer underwrites your plan. A policy that excludes “losses arising directly from war” may still pay out for a flight cancellation caused by rising fuel surcharges or route suspensions, because the proximate cause of loss is a commercial decision by the airline, not the war itself. This is not guaranteed — but it is the kind of nuance your broker should be clarifying with your insurer right now.

What is almost certainly not covered: booking a new, more expensive replacement flight on your own initiative without formal airline cancellation and without consulting your insurer first. If you pre-emptively rebook and pay the higher fare, do not assume you can claim the difference.

The Concert Cancellation Lesson Happening in Parallel

This week, Hong Kong is also watching a parallel story unfold in real time. Over 100 fans — many of whom had already flown in or booked hotels — filed complaints with the Consumer Council after Taiwanese band Mayday rescheduled their March 24 Kai Tak Stadium concert with less than two weeks’ notice. The total value of complaints exceeded HK$296,000, with complainants coming from both Hong Kong and mainland China.

The lesson is the same one that applies to flight disruptions: travellers who had policies including event cancellation or trip curtailment cover have options. Those who did not are chasing refunds through consumer watchdogs.

When you book travel to attend a specific event — a concert, a sports fixture, an exhibition — your trip has a single point of failure. If that event changes, your entire trip cost is suddenly at risk. Many standard travel policies do not include event cancellation; it needs to be either a built-in policy feature or a separate add-on.

Practical Steps for Hong Kong Travellers This Week

If you have flights booked through the Middle East in the next 60 days:

• Check with your airline today whether your routing is affected
• Review your travel policy’s war and civil unrest exclusions and delay provisions
• Contact your broker to confirm whether a route suspension qualifies as a covered cancellation under your specific policy
• Do not rebook unilaterally before speaking with your insurer

If you are travelling specifically to attend an event:

• Confirm your policy includes trip curtailment or event cancellation cover
• Keep all receipts — hotels, flights, transfers — in case of a curtailment claim
• Check whether your policy covers pre-travel cancellation by the event organiser, or only cancellation initiated by you

If you are travelling for business:

• Corporate travel policies often have broader cover for disruption and rerouting than personal leisure policies
• If your company’s group travel policy was arranged some time ago, the terms may predate the current geopolitical environment — a review is worthwhile

The Bigger Picture for 2026

The Middle East conflict is a reminder that geopolitical events can escalate faster than travellers or insurers can adapt. The key is not to wait for disruption to hit and then discover what your policy does not cover. The time to understand your coverage is before you travel — ideally before you even book.

At Navigator, our advisors can walk through your existing travel policy and identify any gaps the current environment makes more relevant — whether that is war exclusions, trip cancellation triggers, or the difference between airline-initiated and traveller-initiated changes.

Flights are getting more expensive. Routes are being suspended. And the situation is evolving daily. Make sure your insurance is keeping up.