Dubai now, pay later
The UAE, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan, Ukraine, Russia, and Nigeria.
Hello,
Here are the five things you need to know today:
THE UAE. As scandals mount, the Emirates must protect its reputation.
IRAN. TURKEY. Talk of a nuclear arms race heats up.
PAKISTAN. A minerals-based partnership looks critical.
UKRAINE. RUSSIA. Brussels and Paris prepare their offramp for Kyiv.
NIGERIA. A US intervention appears more about mammon than God.
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES. Sunny place, shady people
As scandals mount, the Emirates must protect its reputation.
Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna named DP World’s CEO as an improperly redacted figure in the Epstein files. Quebec’s La Caisse later cancelled a deal with DP World. Reuters said the UAE had built a secret base in Ethiopia for Sudan’s RSF.
INTELLIGENCE. In the wake of reports Abu Dhabi had secretly taken a 49% stake in a Trump family crypto venture in exchange for an Nvidia chip waiver, the release of dozens of sordid messages from DP World’s Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, including one related to an alleged “torture video”, has brought the UAE yet more of the wrong kind of attention. A brand built on discretion and reliability could now easily be lost to rival commercial centres, like Doha.
FOR BUSINESS. Keir Starmer and Howard Lutnick appear to be toughing out their own Epstein-related scandals, but their links, thus far, are less explicit. The Emirates has cash and infrastructure. It’ll be hard to displace Dubai or Abu Dhabi. But the region is littered with once-great entrepots (e.g., Aden, Alexandria), which businesses fled in the wake of uncertainty. To succeed, a global financial hub needs more commercial and political probity than a normal country.
IRAN. TURKEY. Fissile material
Talk of a nuclear arms race heats up.
Donald Trump said he could send a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East ahead of meeting Benjamin Netanyahu. Turkey said it might "inevitably" join a nuclear arms race. A former IRGC commander said Riyadh already had a bomb.
INTELLIGENCE. The commander’s allegations, made to Russian media, are almost
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