Russia’s President Vladimir Putin shakes palms with United Arab Emirates’ President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan throughout a gathering in Saint Petersburg, Russia, October 11, 2022.
Pavel Bednyakov | Sputnik | through Reuters
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — United Arab Emirates President Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan traveled to Russia on Thursday for his second go to to the nation in lower than a 12 months, assembly with Russian President Vladimir Putin in an indication of the ever-strengthening ties between the 2 states.
The journey, in response to Emirati state media service WAM, was targeted on the 2 nations’ “strategic partnership” and on “methods to boost cooperation, notably within the financial, commerce, funding, power, and different areas that serve joint growth, along with regional and worldwide problems with widespread curiosity.”
The UAE is a longtime shut ally of the USA and a significant army and intelligence associate. Additionally it is Russia’s most essential financial associate within the Center East — and commerce between the 2 has ballooned lately, notably for the reason that begin of Russia’s warfare towards Ukraine. Russia-UAE commerce jumped by 68% year-on-year in 2022 to $9 billion, Russia’s commerce ministry mentioned in February.
Now, “the commerce turnover between Russia and the UAE reached $11.5 billion,” Mohammed bin Zayed mentioned throughout talks with Putin on Thursday, in response to Russian state media outlet Tass.
Bin Zayed advised his Russian counterpart: “We wish this determine to be doubled each on the bilateral stage and with Eurasian nations in the course of the subsequent 5 years,” including that relations between the 2 nations “are creating at an accelerated tempo.”
Russia and the UAE signed a strategic partnership in 2018, and quite a few visits between their leaders have been exchanged since then.
Abu Dhabi has not formally taken a aspect on the Russia-Ukraine warfare, as a substitute calling for peace and an finish to the preventing. It has additionally refused to partake in Western sanctions towards Russia, offering a secure haven for Russian oligarchs and expatriates fleeing each sanctions and obligatory conscription.
Some 4,000 Russian companies function within the UAE, in response to studies, and overseas direct funding between the 2 has steadily elevated.
This pool {photograph} distributed by Russian state company Sputnik exhibits Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and President of the United Arab Emirates Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan attending a welcoming ceremony forward of their talks in Abu Dhabi on December 6, 2023.
Sergei Savostyanov | Afp | Getty Photos
The go to by the UAE chief to Moscow “says the UAE values its strategic partnership with Russian and can to proceed to deepen ties with Russia,” Anna Borshchevskaya, a senior fellow at The Washington Institute targeted on Russia’s coverage towards the Center East, advised CNBC.
“As earlier than, the UAE needs to proceed to take care of a diversified overseas coverage total between Russia, the USA, and China, slightly than select just one.”
The UAE chief’s go to additionally comes because the White Home introduced an upcoming assembly between U.S. President Donald Trump and Putin to debate Ukraine warfare ceasefire efforts — and within the wake of Trump saying punitive tariffs on India for importing Russian oil, which the American chief says is “fuelling the warfare machine.”
For Russia, the continued relationship with the UAE is a win and can also be “clearly an indication that they don’t seem to be practically as remoted because the West would love them to be each diplomatically and economically,” mentioned Ryan Bohl, a senior Center East and North Africa analyst at Rane.
“The UAE can also be a key a part of Russia’s efforts to bypass Western sanctions. For [UAE leader] MBZ on a political entrance, it is a demonstration that he’s unbiased of Washington, regardless of counting on American forces for safety,” Bohl mentioned, referring to Mohammed bin Zayed by his initials.
UAE ‘helps gas Russia’s warfare’
The U.S. has prior to now expressed frustration with the UAE’s enabling of Russian imports.
In 2023, the Biden administration known as the UAE a “nation of focus” for circumventing sanctions and export controls on Russia. In line with the U.S. Treasury Division, corporations within the UAE in the course of the second half of 2022 transported greater than $5 million of export-controlled items from the U.S. to Russia — together with semiconductors that may energy weapons on the Ukrainian battlefield.
“The UAE helps facilitate dual-use commerce. It is a vital transit hub for dual-use items, that means items that may have each civilian and army use, so this commerce helps gas Russia’s warfare on Ukraine,” Borshchevskaya mentioned.
The UAE’s Ministry of Overseas Affairs didn’t instantly reply to a CNBC request for remark.
A big plume of smoke covers town after a mass drone and missile assault by the Russian Federation on the capital on Kyiv July 4, 2025 in Kyiv, Ukraine.
Libkos | Getty Photos Information | Getty Photos
Thus far, Washington has not moved to truly punish the Center Japanese nation. Trump has not given the UAE or different Gulf commerce companions the therapy it did to India.
A part of that is due to Abu Dhabi’s function as a mediator between Russia and Western powers. It has facilitated communication between adversaries and brokered prisoner swap offers between Ukraine and Russia. For the reason that warfare’s outbreak in February 2022, the UAE says Emirati mediation efforts have seen 4,181 captives returned dwelling.
The UAE can also be buffered by its mammoth enterprise ties to the U.S. past simply protection: Abu Dhabi is a quickly rising hub for, and investor in, America’s largest AI and tech corporations. Trump’s extremely feted go to to the Gulf area in Could noticed a lot of main offers signed with the UAE throughout sectors, whereas Abu Dhabi in March dedicated to a 10-year, $1.4 trillion funding framework within the U.S.
U.S. President Donald Trump indicators a visitor ebook subsequent to United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, at Qasr Al Watan, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, Could 15, 2025.
Brian Snyder | Reuters
The UAE’s friendship with Russia “is a supply of pressure with the U.S., however not a significant one at this stage, notably below the Trump administration,” mentioned Hussein Ibish, a senior resident scholar on the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.
“Nonetheless, as secondary sanctions are liable to kick in after Trump’s cease-fire deadline concerning the Ukraine warfare… the UAE and Russia are going to wish to coordinate any potential response to such secondary sanctions.”
Whether or not Trump decides to stress Abu Dhabi is one thing leaders within the UAE and wider Gulf area will doubtless be watching carefully. However the small, oil-rich sheikhdom will preserve its independence relating to its overseas coverage choices, says Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official and resident scholar on the American Enterprise Institute.
“The UAE is now not taken with being a part of huge coalitions or stress campaigns; it should base its coverage on a slim and bare calculation of its personal pursuits and permit others to waste their time and power on sanctions, coercion, and nice energy competitors,” Rubin advised CNBC.
“MBZ will do what’s proper for UAE, and never put all his eggs within the American, Chinese language, or Russian baskets.”
