Abu Dhabi Airports has reported processing 1.90 million passengers at the Abu Dhabi International airport (AUH) in October, down 0.9 per cent from the same period in the previous year.

The total number of passengers that passed through the airport between January and October totaled 20.4 million, some 5.4 per cent higher compared with the first 10 months of 2015, the company said in a statement.

The airport operator did not provide specific details of the factors that triggered a decline in the number of passengers in October.

Passenger traffic at the airport has been growing at a compounded average of 17 per cent annually since 2011.

Other indicators including total aircraft movements and cargo volume grew at 1.3 per cent and 6.7 per cent, respectively, in the first 10 months of the year.

A two-phased expansion of the existing airport is ongoing, with the objective of bringing the current capacity of 17.5 million passengers a year to 32 million passengers.

The under-construction, $2.9bn Midfield Terminal Complex (MTC), is currently being built between the AUH’s two runways and is expected to be completed by 2018.

The MTC has suffered a series of delays since the project was first launched in 2005, but once ready it will deliver an additional capacity of 20 million passengers a year.