DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) \u2014 The United Arab Emirates campaigned hard for a seat on the U.N. Security Council in the country\u2019s international push to highlight the 50-year anniversary of its formation. But it got more than it bargained for with Russia\u2019s war on Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The federation of sheikhdoms, home to Dubai\u2019s skyscrapers, abstained in a Security Council vote late last week condemning Moscow\u2019s invasion. The Emirates now carefully hedges its statements to avoid angering a country crucial to its economy as\u00a0it tries to shake off the coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, the United States, whose military provides security guarantees to the Emirates amid tensions over the collapsing nuclear deal with Iran, has lobbied the UAE to add its voice against Moscow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That pressure on the UAE will only grow Monday as the U.N. prepares for only its 11th-ever emergency session of the General Assembly over the war. The Security Council will likely hold more votes as well seeking to condemn Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the Emiratis, they face a major risk in upsetting Russia, which has become an important trade partner, a source of tourists to the UAE and a military power across the wider Middle East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russia firmly rooted its presence in the region during the chaos of the civil war in Syria with its military backing of President Bashar Assad. Russian aircraft, along with Assad\u2019s air forces, \u201cattacked civilian neighborhoods, including crowded markets during the day, with explosive bombs with wide-area effects, killing and injuring civilians in attacks that amounted to war crimes,\u201d\u00a0the U.N.\u2019s Human Rights Council said in a report last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those strikes amounted to \u201csystematic failure to take any precautions to spare civilians from harm,\u201d the report added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But after opposing Assad for years, the UAE has re-established diplomatic and economic ties with Syria,\u00a0with one Emirati official even praising Assad\u2019s \u201cwise leadership\u201d\u00a0during a war that continues today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israel,\u00a0which diplomatically recognized the UAE in 2020, similarly has issued cautiously worded statements since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Israel does not want to disrupt its quiet understanding with Moscow that enables it to carry out airstrikes against Iranian-linked targets in Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Libya, despite a U.N. embargo, the UAE and Russia, along with other countries, have transported weapons to their common ally in the turmoil plaguing that country since the 2011 uprising and killing of dictator Moammar Gadhafi,\u00a0according to U.N. investigators. The UAE also \u201cmay provide some financing\u201d for the Russian mercenary firm Wagner in Libya,\u00a0a Pentagon inspector general report claimed in 2020, though the Emirates disputed the allegation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russian influence extends beyond the battlefield into the hushed diplomatic meetings ongoing in Vienna over the Iranian nuclear deal. The collapse of the accord after then-President Donald Trump\u2019s unilateral withdrawal of America has\u00a0sparked years of attacks across the Mideast\u00a0that have slowly drawn closer and closer to the Emirates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since the start of this year, Abu Dhabi has faced a series of drone and missile attacks from Yemen\u2019s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, including\u00a0one that killed three people and wounded six others at a state oil depot. The UAE, which has been part of a Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis, long has viewed Iran as an existential threat but has sought to cool tensions with Tehran amid the negotiations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Emiratis\u2019 effort to avoid directly blaming Russia for the Ukraine war likely raised attention in Washington \u2014 particularly since\u00a0U.S. military forces fired Patriot missiles batteries in combat for the first time in nearly 20 years to defend Abu Dhabi from the recent attacks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russia\u2019s ambassador in Vienna has been a vocal proponent of restoring the nuclear deal. Iran\u2019s hardline president, meanwhile, has echoed Moscow\u2019s stance by repeatedly calling NATO expansion in Europe a \u201cserious threat,\u201d even as protesters recently braved security forces in Tehran to chant, \u201cDeath to Putin!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those tensions can even be seen in the staid realm of government statements. In a call Thursday to Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke about \u201cRussia\u2019s premeditated, unprovoked and unjustified attack against Ukraine,\u201d according to Blinken\u2019s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A later Emirati statement described the two as merely discussing \u201cbilateral strategic relations and ways of strengthening joint cooperation.\u201d There was no mention of Ukraine or Russia — just like in another statement acknowledging a call between Sheikh Abdullah and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sheikh Abdullah also had been scheduled to visit Lavrov on Monday in Moscow, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry. Emirati officials, however, did not acknowledge the scheduled meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile Monday, the U.N. Security Council passed an Emirati proposal to put an expanded arms embargo on the Houthis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Emirati-Russian relations also focus largely on business as well, something visible in the Cyrillic signs dotting the UAE\u2019s cavernous malls and airport concourses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russia led oil producers outside of OPEC into a production deal that propped up prices, to the benefit of the Emirates and neighboring Saudi Arabia. The UAE also is Russia\u2019s largest economic partner in the wider Gulf Cooperation Council, with total trade last year between the two countries estimated at $4 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Among the throngs flooding to Dubai\u2019s beaches and nightclubs amid the pandemic, Russians made up their third-largest source market for tourists in 2021. For the northern emirate of Ras al-Khaimah, Russians represented their No. 1 tourist market last year. Russia also remains an important buyer in Dubai\u2019s boom-and-bust real estate market \u2014\u00a0which also has attracted the attention of those trying to subvert international sanctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For now, though,\u00a0the Emiratis appear to be like India in carefully abstaining from criticizing Russia. In explaining her country\u2019s abstention Thursday, Emirati Ambassador Lana Zaki Nusseibeh described the vote as a \u201cforgone conclusion,\u201d likely referring to Russia\u2019s veto power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, her country campaigned for that Security Council seat they now hold. And it will continue to put them under pressure internationally as long as Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine rages on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) \u2014 The United Arab Emir […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1263"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1265,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1263\/revisions\/1265"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}