Abu Dhabi and Dubai Blog

A sordid story on the human cost of prohibition laws – much more severe than what they are trying to prevent:

A court in the United Arab Emirates has sentenced 17 Indian nationals to death for killing a Pakistani man. About 50 people were involved in the fatal attack in which the Pakistani man was stabbed repeatedly.

In another event:

In February it was reported that 13 members of an alleged bootlegging gang from the Jebel Ali area of Dubai were accused of kidnapping two rivals, raping them and burying them alive.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8592724.stm

A rare whale shark that was a hotel attraction has been returned to the wild, the resort said Thursday, following an international campaign against the captivity. The 4.2-metre female was returned to the Gulf waters where it had been “rescued” said the hotel, where guests pay up to $7,500 US a night for a top suite.

http://www.montrealgazette.com/travel/Dubai+hotel+frees+whale+shark/2701800/story.html

Some good financial analysis on the shifting economic power arrangements of the UAE since the devastating crash of last year:

Abu Dhabi has pumped $15 billion into Dubai since last year, providing proof of the strength of the federation but also evidence of a power shift within the union. The Dubai Financial Market may have lost 25% of its value since November and Dubai World has yet to agree to a deal with banks on its remaining $22 billion debt pile, but the principles of the union have passed a stern test. However, the outcome is likely to be that Abu Dhabi takes a more dominant role in the U.A.E. while Dubai takes a back seat. While Dubai has sold assets overseas to help pay its bills, Abu Dhabi has continued to invest by building stakes in household names like Daimler and Barclays.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703862704575099750771561886.html?mod=WSJ_latestheadlines

Two Britons accused of kissing in public in Dubai face up to a month in prison after a mother complained her child had seen them. The case is the third in under two years in which Britons have fallen foul of decency laws in Dubai. Dubai’s burgeoning foreign population, which now outnumbers that of Emirati nationals, has sparked concerns that the pace of change is threatening the conservative region’s social and religious identity.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/mar/14/kiss-dubai-britons-public

Washington Post laments the unfair treatment of Israel in the Dubai Hamas assasination:

Lt. Gen. Dahi Khalfan Tamim, the police chief of Dubai, certainly knows how to milk a good story for all it’s worth. It’s now been six weeks since Hamas operative Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was found dead in his room in an airport hotel, and most of the world long ago concluded that Israel’s Mossad spy agency was responsible. Yet day after day Tamim continues to make headlines, dribbling out more details of the clumsy and not-so-clandestine operation and issuing grandiose pronouncements.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2010/03/the_dubai_police_chiefs_outlan.html