Throughout the process which led to the creation of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Rashid had enjoyed a relatively untroubled relationship with most of the Rulers of the Trucial States, now his colleagues in the UAE’s Supreme Council. Indeed, one of the most notable changes in Dubai’s foreign relations, leading up to the end of 1971 had been a gradual thawing of relations between Dubai and Sharjah.
The two neighbours had been competitors for more than a century. A particularly poor spell in the history of relations between the two had been ended by the peaceful, British instigated ouster in 1965 of Sheikh Saqr bin Sultan Al Qasimi, who had ruled since 1951. Sheikh Saqr had immediately sought the help of the governments of Egypt, Iraq and the United Arab Republic, along with the Arab League, but to no avail. He had gradually disappeared into an unsettled exile in Cairo.
The Ruler since 1965, Sheikh Khalid bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, was well known to the Ruling family of Dubai. Sheikh Rashid was fond of his counterpart in Sharjah whose drive and enthusiasm to improve the lot of his subjects and build a modern state was, according to individuals who knew both, matched only by that of the Dubai Ruler. Although the competitive nature of both states — plus a number of unresolved issues including water rights and a hotly disputed border — meant that Sheikh Rashid and Sheikh Khalid were certainly not going to be great comrades, there was, say witnesses, an understanding that each was striving for the same thing. Sheikh Rashid enjoyed the company of his younger colleague and, while they often found themselves on opposing sides when debating the Federal issue, a mutual respect was evident.
The longer Sheikh Khalid ruled, the more popular he became within his own sheikhdom and farther afield. Dissent rumbled on though, and the suspicion remained that the former Ruler, Sheikh Saqr still harboured the belief that one day he might return. As late as January 1970 explosives were discovered under Sheikh Khalid’s chair in his Majlis and in December 1971, the same month that the UAE agreement was signed, Deputy Ruler Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammed was injured by a lone gunman who was never apprehended.
Security was still high around the Sharjah Ruler when at dusk on January 25, 1972 — the United Arab Emirates just fifty-four days old — a group of eighteen rebels, headed by Sheikh Saqr bin Sultan himself, shot their way into the Ruler’s Palace. Shooting and hand grenade explosions could be heard clearly by some residents in Dubai and Sheikh Rashid scrambled Union Defence Force (UDF) troops from Dubai city to join those from Sharjah at the scene. The force from Dubai was headed by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, who was present throughout the crisis. Shooting continued throughout the night, at one point with Sheikh Rashid appearing close to the scene of the battle to consult with a Captain Cameron, a British Officer who had been seconded to the UDF.
At dawn the rebels surrendered and were taken into custody. Sheikh Khalid had been murdered, and it is believed that a member of his entourage was also killed, while several UDF men were injured in the fighting. Captain Cameron was later visited by Sheikh Rashid in Al Maktoum Hospital where he was being treated for a gunshot wound to the leg.
The death of a capable leader was a blow to the stability of the area. Sheikh Rashid was also present to mourn the death of Sheikh Khalid as he was buried later that same morning. The Dubai leader refused to accept that a leader could be deposed in such a manner during the latter stages of the twentieth century, especially in the face of the UAE’s newly established statehood.
Dubai led behind-the-scenes moves for Sheikh Saqr bin Sultan to be banished for a second time and tacitly supported efforts internally in Sharjah to appoint Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, brother of the late Sheikh Khalid, as Ruler. In the days following Sheikh Khalid’s murder, Sheikh Rashid travelled to Abu Dhabi to meet with President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan, aiming to forge a coherent government response to the crisis. The two eventually turned to Sheikh Sultan, who had long been influential in Sharjah and had been appointed UAE Minister of Education in the first cabinet. As a serving minister he was well known to the Dubai Ruler. Sheikh Rashid and Sheikh Sultan had often sat together to discuss a variety of topics, including the latter’s thoughts on agriculture and how this could be developed in the region.
“The ink was hardly dry on the UAE Federal agreement when this unwanted diversion in Sharjah tested the member states,” recalls Humaid bin Drai. “Sheikh Rashid once again found himself at the centre of diplomatic efforts, firstly to restore calm, then to organise a smooth handover of power to a legitimate family successor.
“You have to remember that the United Arab Emirates was hardly two months old at the time. There had been little time to build cohesion and I think Sheikh Rashid knew Sheikh Khalid’s death had the potential to destabilise the accord. He spent days on the phone and meeting emissaries from the other leaders. In the final analysis, he and the President, Sheikh Zayed, took control over the first major crisis the Emirates had faced and steered it to a satisfactory conclusion. The end result was the right one for Sharjah and the UAE as a whole.”
Sheikh Khalid’s untimely death came against a backdrop of unwanted strife with the UAE’s biggest and most powerful neighbour, Iran. The Trucial Sates and Persia had enjoyed fruitful commercial relations for perhaps thousands of years. But for well over a century the issue of ownership of three islands — Abu Musa and the Greater and Lesser Tunbs — had strained relations and occasionally brought both sides of the Gulf to the brink of conflict.
Dubai had been drawn into the impasse during the 1920s, when the Iranian navy intercepted a passenger vessel en route from Dubai to Greater Tunb. Its passengers, most Dubaians, were detained in Lingah. The incident almost brought both Dubai and the British into open conflict with Iran.
Tensions over the islands rumbled on until the 1970s. When the British government revealed that it was preparing to renege on its security responsibilities within the region, the Shah of Iran and his government saw an opportunity. As early as June 5, 1971, British Envoy Sir William Luce informed the Rulers of Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah that the Iranians were deadly seriously in their intention to ensure sovereignty of the Arab islands. This came hot on the heels of an announcement by Iranian Foreign Minister Ardeshir Zahedi, in March, that he “hoped the British government would hand over Abu Musa and the Tunbs” and, earlier, a reported threat by the Shah that he would ensure Iranian ownership “by force if necessary.”
On November 29, 1971, two days before the UAE federal agreement was set to be completed, Sheikh Khalid of Sharjah announced that he had agreed the terms of a deal with Iran. The deal was to allow Iran basing rights in some areas of Abu Musa while Sharjah would retain political control. Revenues from oil exploration would be shared equally, while Iran was to pay Sharjah £1.5 million every year until the latter’s receipts from oil exceeded £3 million a year.
The following day, November 30, Iranian troops landed on Abu Musa in accordance with the agreement, but instead of occupying designated areas they took control of the whole island. They also landed on Greater and Lesser Tunbs and fought a gun battle with Ras Al Khaimah policemen, during which four Arabs and three Iranians died.
This issue rumbles on until the present day. As Vice-President of the UAE, and later its Prime Minister, Sheikh Rashid was ardently opposed to the Iranian occupation of UAE lands. He often made representations to Iranian officials and made regular statements, aimed at keeping this issue in the newspapers and alive in the public domain.
There were further problems to contend with in 1972 when fighting erupted between bedu tribesman affiliated to both Fujairah and Sharjah. The skirmishing took place around the Sharjah enclaves of Kalba and Khor Fakkan, near Fujairah, and tradition tensions between the bedu suddenly boiled over in a land dispute. The Union Defence Force rushed to intervene and quickly took up positions between the combatants, but not before twenty-two men were killed and around a dozen seriously injured.
A political settlement was needed and, once again, Sheikh Rashid intervened, sending emissaries to deal with both sides and evolve a dialogue. Other leaders did likewise and on July 17 a statement from the federal government announced that a settlement had been reached.
Sheikh Khalid’s death, along with unexpected events such as the bedu skirmishing, only served to highlight the uncertainties surrounding those in power throughout the Middle East. Regional politics were a minefield which regularly claimed the lives of Rulers and senior politicians. In 1971 alone — the year before Sheikh Khalid’s death — senior officials including Iraqi Prime Minister Air Marshal Hardan Takriti and Jordanian Prime Minister Wasfi al Tall were assassinated. Being heavyweights in the regional sphere, both were well guarded, as they would clearly have been targets.
Dubai and the United Arab Emirates clearly played a more reserved role and were, by comparison to Iraq and Jordan, relatively neutral and therefore less likely to make enemies. The UAE, though, was asserting its national identity and opinions on a wide range of issues affecting the Middle East. Many senior UAE officials had only light protection, and clearly the Emirates were not considered immune from the malaise of terrorism. This was borne out by the extremist killing of Khalifa Ahmed Al Mubarak, UAE Ambassador to France, on February 9, 1984. Closer to home the March 1975 slaying of King Faisal ibn Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, by a disenfranchised relative during an open Majlis, was ample proof of the burden of power.
As Vice-President of the UAE, later with the dual portfolio of Prime Minister, Sheikh Rashid was a player on the regional stage. His reputation as a serious politician only enhanced the security threat perceived by Dubai and federal officials. As a relative neutral, at one time or another Sheikh Rashid met figures from virtually all the sides of the splintered divide. Americans, Iranians, Palestinians and Jordanians, all seen to have considered him someone who would see past the rhetoric. As Khalifa Saeed Al Naboodah put it, “he was accepted by all the Rulers of the Arabian coast, of the Gulf and the major players from Europe, Russia and North America. From what I saw, when he talked people would take his opinion seriously and know he meant exactly what he said. There were not enough politicians like him.”
As such, Sheikh Rashid must always have been in a measure of danger, particularly when in public. To the disquiet of those charged with his security, however, he dismissed such trappings of power, claiming that they restricted his free movement and access to people.
“Sheikh Rashid absolutely refused security, or a bodyguard,” recalls Al Naboodah, who in 1971 was assistant Minister of Defence to Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid. “Eventually a compromise was reached with soldiers in his bodyguard dressed in plain clothes, and keeping their arms well hidden. We argued that you could never properly assess the dangers to his security, certainly those which came from outside the UAE, but Sheikh Rashid would never be persuaded.”
Even then, Sheikh Rashid would often stop his car by the side of the road, flag down his bodyguard following in a car behind his, and then send them back to the palace or instruct them to wait at his office. Relatives and officials were often sent into a spin as the Ruler and his close friends disappeared into Dubai to review projects, without any security cover and, indeed, anyone knowing exactly where he was.
Sheikh Rashid was fifty-nine years old when the United Arab Emirates was established through the federal agreement. Since his teens he had played a role in affairs of state and since the late 1930s had effectively ruled over Dubai. Taking on a backbreaking workload, he had laboured to develop the sheikhdom through the pre-oil years, a pace only increased when the petro-dollar opened the way for even bigger and better development. And through the late 1960s he had also vigorously pursued the federation, in an energy-sapping three years of ongoing diplomacy.
One could have expected the newly installed UAE Vice-President to be tired of his responsibilities, but instead those around him report a new Sheikh Rashid, charged by the need to adapt his city to the realities of its position within a larger state, and manage development of this larger entity.
“His workload during this period was enormous, but he loved his work,” says Al Naboodah. “On top of Dubai there was also the federation to consider. There were roads to be built, houses to construct and more. He would often visit project sites before the contractors had arrived in the morning and be waiting for them with comments.
“He would go on working all day and the evening we would all meet at the Jumeirah Majlis until late in the night. We called the Jumeirah Majlis Dubai’s version of Hyde Park Corner, as it was open for anyone to come and express an opinion. Ideas were discussed and refined between politicians, engineers and military leaders, all nationalities and walks of life. This was true democracy.
“How Sheikh Rashid kept up his schedule we did not know, and men a lot younger than him used to escape for a couple of hours’ sleep. As I said, it was his love for his work which gave him this energy.”
With the political upheavals of the day all British political infrastructure had gone and the Vice-President was in large part responsible for replacing these with functioning government. With its great relative wealth by comparison to most of the other entities within the Emirates, Dubai was tied to large scale funding through the federal apparatus. There was always more to do, however, and Sheikh Rashid was keen to bring to the Northern Emirates the basic facilities which Dubai’s population, by then, took for granted. He turned his attention to health, education and infrastructure.
“When he was once addressed to support the construction of a hospital in another emirate, he sent me the same day to examine the situation and report back to him,” states Khalaf Al Habtoor, one of the motivated young nationals in the Majlis circle who Sheikh Rashid attempted to encourage. “That emirate desperately needed a hospital. I told Sheikh Rashid in the same afternoon. He ordered the construction of two hospitals there, and detailed plans were presented two weeks later.”
As UAE Education Minister, a post he held until 1979, Dr Abdullah Omran was responsible for one of the Prime Minister’s pet departments. Interviewed in 1990, Dr Abdullah recalled a time in 1972 when the UAE’s Education Ministry took over the reins of the seven separate education departments. A lot of work was evidently needed, but first there was something of a crisis to attend with. “In 1972, when the Ministry of Education was formed, it wanted to take over responsibility for education from the Kuwaitis (who had provided teachers and financial support to several emirates before 1972). There were people who did not agree with the idea. They wanted the schools to remain under Kuwaiti management.”
Over the early months of the federation, these opposing views polarised into two definite camps and Dr Abdullah admitted, “we were not sure about our course of action”.
Sheikh Rashid called a meeting on the problem in early 1973 and after hearing both sides he came down on the side of those who wished the UAE to run its own education system, saying: “Our people are fully capable of running our own schools.”
“In the federal government… he had given undivided attention to the promotion of education,” said Dr Abdullah. “Attention was given to industrial, technical, agricultural and vocational education. Adult education centres were also opened, for the benefit of those who had missed the opportunity of going to school in their childhood. Measures were also taken to provide training to teachers and, finally, the UAE University was set up in 1977-78. In all of these developments, Sheikh Rashid had played a key role.
“He was very vocal in his support for the establishment of the university. Sheikh Rashid had always given total support to the programme of sending national students abroad for higher studies. Several overseas scholarship programmes were financed by him personally.”
He was also vigorous in insisting that women were given access to a formal education. Several of the UAE’s constituents had been slow in providing education for females. Sheikh Rashid believed that this would ultimately hold back economic development. On January 4, 1974, he said: “The UAE is providing a formal education for more women. This will help the stability of the UAE, while having benefits in women’s health and humanity. If women succeed in education they will know how to help the UAE. One day I foresee women playing a vital role in the economy, social areas and government.”
The political landscape in Dubai was also changing, especially as Sheikh Rashid began to move his growing sons into positions of responsibility. An Arab Press Service report credited Sheikh Rashid with creating what it described as one of the “smallest bureaucracies in the world,” a well-oiled machine in which businessmen could move easily. Indeed, the same story quoted Sheikh Mohammed as saying that the Al Maktoums wished to position Dubai as a “modern entity where business should be in the front seat and politics come next.”
Evidently business was still very much the driving force for Dubai, but by the 1970s it was oil which was revolutionising the city-state. Sheikh Rashid had overseen Dubai’s full-scale entry into oil exportation in 1969 and was not to complete the granting of concessions on all available territory, land and sea, until October 1982. Southwest Fateh was to begin producing in 1972, followed by Falah in 1978 and Rashid in 1979. In 1970 Dubai was exporting 34,510 barrels a day, a figure that would rise to approximately 131,590 barrels a day in 1983 and ultimately to four hundred thousand barrels a day in 1990. In 1975 Dubai nationalised the oil industry; at the time, production was around 250,000 barrels per day. The firms affected — Conoco, Total, Repsol, RWE-DEA and Wintersall — received $110 million in compensation.
All this was excellent for the Dubai exchequer but it had long been abundantly clear that while the emirate was to be a major producer into the following century, Dubai did not boast the massive reserves of some Gulf states. With that in mind the Al Maktoum family continued to manage the city state from a pro-business angle.
It was five in the morning when Neville Allen, for nearly two decades one of Sheikh Rashid’s most trusted advisors, was woken in bed by the telephone. He fumbled for the receiver, still groggy, to hear the terse voice of one of Sheikh Rashid’s retinue on the line. “Sheikh Rashid needs you immediately. We are just off the road near Jebel Ali.”
Disturbed by the sudden request, Allen hurriedly dressed and rushed by car along the well-worn track which was euphemistically described as a ‘road’. He found Sheikh Rashid and his party on top of the hill on whose flanks Jebel Ali Village lies today. In 1972, however, there was not a building to be seen, although on clear days one could just about make out parts of Satwa, on the outskirts of Dubai.
“Down there,” Sheikh Rashid is said to have demanded, pointing towards the nearby coastline, “I want to build a port.”
The leader had a firm plan in his mind, in typical fashion explained this to Allen and then demanded an on-the-spot guide as to how much this would cost.
“I gave him a rough estimate,” Allen recalls. “Then and there he told me to go ahead with the project. He was an exceptionally brilliant man, who worked with lightning speed.”
In the days before Allen had learned the Ruler’s thinking, the then Head of Dubai Customs, Khalifa Al Naboodah, had also been stunned when taken into Sheikh Rashid’s confidence.
The Dubai Ruler liked to get out of the city and in the early 1970s it was not unusual for him to pitch a tent in the Jebel Ali area and ‘commute’ into work each morning. The evenings at Jebel Ali were taken up by a relaxed Majlis, by invitation only, followed by dinner.
Darkness had fallen one evening when Al Naboodah found himself alone with the Ruler. The two sat around a small campfire in the open air, talking quietly, when Sheikh Rashid chose to shock Al Naboodah, one of his most trusted lieutenants. “When he told me that he was going to build a port, right where we were sitting, my immediate reaction was to laugh,” says Al Naboodah. “When I realised that he was serious I tried to offer what I though was reason. I was Head of Customs at the time and fully aware that there was spare capacity at Port Rashid. I begged him to think, instead, about extending the existing port.”
“I’m not looking forward to next year, or even the next five years,” explained Sheikh Rashid to his incredulous, and somewhat disturbed, subject. “I’m looking ahead perhaps fifty years. We’ve got money, so what is the point of keeping it in the bank? Eventually we will definitely need more port capacity and in twenty years this could cost us double or triple the price to build that it will cost us now.”’
Even today, Al Naboodah admits that he, like nearly everyone around Sheikh Rashid, was not convinced. “He made it clear that he was the man running things and this was his decision. As he so often would, he ultimately proved us all wrong.”
Almost immediately planning began on Jebel Ali Port, thirty-five kilometres from the city and a hundred and twenty kilometres from the entrance to the Gulf.
“Sheikh Rashid wished Dubai to be to the Middle East what Hong Kong was to the Far East,” states Sultan bin Sulayem, son of Sheikh Rashid’s former Majlis favourite Ahmed bin Sulayem, who on the completion of Jebel Ali became its chairman. “He felt Jebel Ali could be brought closer to the city through the provision of proper access facilities, while it was far enough away to be completely industrialised. Jebel Ali was to be a massive industrial complex, would help to diversify Dubai’s economy away from reliance on oil, and most importantly attract new commerce to the emirate.”
At the time Abdullah Saleh was a rising star in the banking sector as a senior official in the government’s own National Bank of Dubai. One evening in 1972 he was specifically invited to attend the evening Majlis.
“I think reaction in the Majlis was, frankly, incredulous,” says Saleh. “Hardly anyone had prior knowledge of what he was planning and most thought the idea of a port way out of Dubai in Jebel Ali was foolhardy. Not for the last time Sheikh Rashid was proven quite right. In fact, if you consider that ultimately Dubai would have had to have additional port facilities, the eventual bill of Dh6.5 billion was minuscule compared with one of perhaps six times that, if you attempted to build Jebel Ali today.”
It was to take four years, until August 1976, until ground was broken on the Mina Jebel Ali project and the initial phase, comprising some sixty-six berths, was not fully completed until 1983.
The shock which met the Ruler’s decision on work at Jebel Ali had hardly eased when Sheikh Rashid, just weeks later, grasped the nettle on another project which had been criticised by many as a white elephant. As early as 1967 the Majlis had poured scorn on a vague plan to build a major dry dock in Dubai. The Ruler and his advisors had wanted private investment, none had been forthcoming and for a time little was heard of a dry dock. Weeks after plans for Jebel Ali surfaced, Sheikh Rashid revealed that the government was to build a facility close to Port Rashid, and put Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid at the head of the organisation. Ignoring advice that constructing this was premature, Sheikh Rashid went ahead with the project and in 1979 Dubai Dry Docks opened, boasting three basins, one of which could accommodate vessels of one million tons (DWT). A writer in a 1990 book, ‘Rashid and His Leadership’, quoted an off-the-record comment by a subsequent boss at the Dubai Dry Dock. Reflecting on a full order book he mused: “I represent one of the world’s largest firms, specialising in establishing and managing Dry Docks, but if it were up to me I would never have approved one as large and ambitious as the Dubai Dockyard, because building a dock for a one million ton ship was inconceivable. I wonder how the mind of the Ruler conceived of such a gigantic project.”
If this were not enough, Sheikh Rashid sparked a furore within his domain through the announcement that he was planning to build, in an undeveloped area on the outskirts of Dubai, a thirty-nine-storey building which was to be called the Dubai International Trade Centre. Of all his major projects during the early 1970s, this was, unquestionably, the one for which he drew most criticism.
“It is too far from town,” said some, while others countered that Sheikh Rashid’s latest ‘white elephant’ was “uncalled for and unlikely to be commercially viable.” They believed that the Dubai International Trade Centre would be a symbol of Sheikh Rashid’s over-enthusiasm, but after more than a quarter of a century it stands as a monument to Dubai’s status as the region’s trading centre. Today called the Dubai World Trade Centre, it is at the heart of an international exhibition complex, while its position makes it like the gateway to the city, when travelling from the federal capital Abu Dhabi.
“Sheikh Rashid was a genius. His business acumen had no equal,” Sheikh Hasher Mana Al Maktoum commented in a 1990 interview. “Many people regarded these projects as over ambitious and exercises in futility. But Sheikh Rashid knew that these would be pillars of strength for Dubai — and all his actions were vindicated by later events.”
By the turn of the decade OPEC figures reported Dubai’s oil production at three hundred thousand barrels of crude a day. With oil revenue inflating its economy Dubai was, during the early 1970s, arguably performing better during this, Sheikh Rashid’s most ambitious period, than at any point before or since.
The reason for this was not just Dubai’s own income, in itself large enough to ignite and sustain a boom, but spiralling confidence abroad. This was definitely true in the Gulf and among Gulf Arabs. Whether Sheikh Rashid ever did actually say “What is good for the merchants, is good for Dubai,” his oft quoted motto-cum-policy-statement, is open to doubt. But what was more important was that general perception believed this to be the attitude of the Ruler and his government.
One isolated statistic puts into context the economic expansion that Dubai was witnessing. Even though the UAE was in existence, the old Qatari-Dubai Riyal was still in circulation, and there was a joint Central Bank. In January 1973 new notes to the value of QDR18 million were issued, the bulk, QDR13 million, issued in Qatar. During the same period Central Bank withdrawals were put at QDR1 million in Qatar and QDR14 million in Dubai.
Indications from this are, without doubt, of a massive capital outflow from Qatar in favour of Dubai. One can attribute a proportion of this to trade (a maximum of ten per cent according to one financial writer) and a smaller slice to shopping (Dubai’s stores far outstripped those of its neighbour). The vast majority, though, represents investment. Such a massive surplus was thought to be repeated on a wider scale, and so offers a guide, however basic, to the substantial funds flowing into Dubai during this time.
This, too, meant that wealth was passing from the government and Ruling family into the hands of the population. Not so much the “trickle-down effect” as a financial avalanche. Despite a relatively recent breakthrough into the oil producing age, this fact was already beginning to show through during the early years of the 1970s. By December 1972, Dubaians as a whole were responsible for some $185 million in bank deposits. This was already ahead of the Nationals in the federal capital, Abu Dhabi, with some $120 million, while the figure compared favourably with long-term oil producers Bahrain ($195 million) and Qatar ($150 million).
The 1975 book, A Hundred Million Dollars A Day, places much of this apparent success at the door of Sheikh Rashid. “Ruled by its wily merchant prince, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum… the emirate’s development has been stimulated [through] liberal commercial and financial regulations, and almost total absence of civil servants, paperwork and restrictions of foreign ownership of local industrial and commercial enterprises.” The author, a correspondent for the Financial Times added: “Sheikh Rashid ran his emirate more as if he were the owner of a large holding company than a head of state. The ease with which foreign companies can do business in Dubai, plus the fact that by Gulf standards Dubai is an attractive state (and) had excellent international telecommunications… has encouraged a number of groups to establish their regional headquarters in the emirate.”
The formation of the UAE had also meant that seven separate voices had evolved into one. As the UAE, they now had a greater role on the international stage and were suddenly capable of bringing pressure to bear on the regional scene.
As the eighteenth and newest member of the Arab League, and the hundred and thirty-second state to take full membership of the United Nations, the United Arab Emirates had a role to play. As befitted a patriotic Arab state, this was soon speaking out on behalf of the Palestinian cause and at UAE’s first Arab League meeting, in Cairo in December 1972, it played a full part in an effort to coordinate the economic attack on Israel.
Earlier, in June, the Sheikh Rashid told journalists: “We will continue our support for the Arab cause and our brothers are exerting efforts to end the Israeli occupation of Arab lands through a just, peaceful settlement. If Israel did not respond to peace efforts the patience of our brothers who have lost their land will run out.
“All states should shoulder their responsibilities in this respect because the cause of the Palestinian people is just and they have been deprived of their legitimate rights. We will continue to aid our Palestinian brothers because we believe they have a just cause and it is our duty.”
The following October 1973 the Ramadan War of 1973 between Israel and the massed forces of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Jordan and other Arab states brought the entire Middle East to the brink of full-scale conflict. There were also wider implications for all the Gulf as, in a gesture of defiance to the US which was openly supporting Israel, eleven members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) agreed on a coordinated programme of oil production and export cuts aimed at forcing the US to alter its Middle East policy. On October 10,1973, Sheikh Rashid stated: “We are firmly against a situation where the United States is supporting Israel against the Arab Nation. The US is against the Arab Nation in providing military and financial aid for Israel, which is using both to harm the rights of Arabs. We are brothers together and have decided to stop supplying oil to the US. We will also take the same steps against other countries who work against the fair case of the Palestinians.”
Raising the stakes further, on October 17, six of the largest Gulf producers announced a rise in crude oil prices by seventeen per cent and an increase of seventy per cent in taxes on oil companies.
Sheikh Rashid stated: “The UAE follows with great concern the news of fighting our brothers are launching on the Egyptian and Syrian fronts to liberate our land and our nation’s dignity. The UAE believes the battle concerns the whole Arab nation.”
He later repeated the same sentiments to several British reporters, and added his own voice to a chorus seeking international help. “The international community has to shoulder responsibility for the Palestinians,” he was quoted as saying, while also reaffirming his state’s commitment to the Arab oil embargo.
The war and its repercussions rumbled on for some time, both politically and economically, and was brought indirectly to Dubai on July 20 when a Japan Airlines aircraft was forced to land at the city’s airport. It sat on the tarmac for three days while negotiations went on, with one hundred and thirty-seven passengers aboard, before flying to Libya where all aboard were released and the aircraft was blown up.
Dubai International Airport was again in the spotlight on December 23, 1973. Some days earlier three Palestinian hijackers had taken control of a KLM Royal Dutch Airlines Boeing 747, seeking to draw attention to Holland’s alleged support for Israel. After four days of erratic behaviour, flying from airport to airport, the 747 was granted permission to land in Dubai where local authorities brought the hijack to an end.
This was not the last occasion when Dubai was dragged onto the world stage in such circumstances. After the Palestine Liberation Organisation had been recognised as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian cause, PLO chairman Yasser Arafat gave his famous speech to the United Nations General Assembly on November 13, 1974, during which he stated: “I carry an olive branch in one hand and a machine gun in the other. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hands.” The speech was a watershed, but was viewed by more extreme elements as too conciliatory.
On November 22, 1972 Sheikh Rashid was “horrified” when notified that a British Airways jet had been hijacked after taking off from his Dubai International Airport. The plane was subsequently forced to land in Tunis, and one passenger was murdered, before the hijackers surrendered. Ironically the act was carried out on the same day that the UN, responding to Arafat’s measured speech, passed two resolutions declaring Palestinian sovereignty rights and granting the Palestinians observer status to the world body.
Over subsequent years, Sheikh Rashid remained on record as a supporter of the Palestinian cause and, indeed, the United Arab Emirates was widely believed to be one of the PLO’s regular benefactors in the Gulf, along with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The PLO used its funds not only to further its struggle with Israel but also for the welfare of Palestinians through hospitals and social welfare institutions throughout the Middle East.
On June 13, 1973, Sheikh Rashid announced to reporters: “We will continue to give help to the Palestinians. We believe there is a fair case and that we have a duty to portray this internationally.” In December of the same year he reiterated this, adding: “The UAE is part of the Arab Nation and we insist that the Palestinians have a case. They have our full support and we will offer both our financial aid and diplomatic efforts.”
In 1981, Sheikh Rashid met with Abdul Muhsin Abu Maizair, PLO official spokesman, in Abu Dhabi, to be briefed on the PLO’s operations. Afterwards Maizair told the official UAE news agency WAM: “Sheikh Rashid showed complete understanding of the Palestinian view and affirmed the UAE’s first support to Palestinian national rights.”
Chairman Arafat often toured the Gulf states and met several times with the UAE’s Vice-President. On one such occasion, he told reporters: “The UAE fully supports all Arab causes, with the Palestinian cause on top of the list, putting its financial resources at the service of such issues and participating in all Arab summits and contacts, aiming at harmonising the Arab stand in such issues.”
The Palestinian cause was of course, in a large part, armed struggle and to a man like Sheikh Rashid committed to peace, funding an armed struggle, however correct, must have been a quandary. On a personal basis he was a great supporter of peaceable projects, quietly and without fanfare backing several hospital and housing projects in the West Bank and neighbouring areas. He also understood that when struggle ended, the Palestinians themselves needed to be equipped for statehood. Education was one of his own pet causes during the development of the Dubai, and later the UAE, and for much of the early 1980s he sought the best opportunity to provide additional facilities for young Palestinians. In 1985 he discovered that Beir Zeit University, in the Occupied West Bank, was still arguably the leading facility for Palestinians at the time, despite the fact that its twenty-five hundred students and two hundred and forty teachers faced constant problems from a lack of funding and harassment from the occupying forces. On November 13, 1985, Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum donated $2.4 million to Beir Zeit on behalf of his father. A new student complex was subsequently constructed on campus and named after Sheikh Rashid.
While the Palestinian struggle was, for half a century, a cause to which the rest of the Arab world has contributed, the Dubai government has also been a major benefactor to a variety of projects throughout the world. From the beginning of the 1970s, with receipts from oil flowing in and the domestic economy performing well, there was a noticeable growth in donations coming from Dubai. “Sheikh Rashid never forgot the days when life was not so good on this peninsula,” observes Abdullah bin Jassim Al Mutairi. “Particularly during the years of depression following the decline of the pearling industry, he had seen for himself the effects of crushing poverty, while he also knew life before proper education and medical facilities. As the leader of an increasingly wealthy Muslim state, he also knew of his responsibilities.”
Of the projects Sheikh Rashid championed, he was particularly proud to have funded the construction of a vitally needed emergency ward and operating theatre complex in a Bhawalpur city hospital, in Punjab. The region had long suffered from a crippling lack of medical facilities, in parallel to Dubai and the Trucial Coast several decades before. Sheikh Rashid was a regular visitor to Pakistan for hunting, was friendly with many of Pakistan’s most influential leaders and certainly aware of the plight of many in the state.
His friend and regular travelling partner Hamad bin Sukat says that as he travelled across Pakistan, Sheikh Rashid would often overwhelm national and local officials whom he encountered, asking without warning for a suggestion on what he could help build or supply. Around Pakistan the Dubai Ruler arranged the construction of dozens of mosques, several schools, an orphanage and the Bhawalpur medical complex, for which he laid the foundation stone in January 1979. When the building was completed in February 1982, the Rashid Wing of B V Hospital in Bhawalpur boasted the most modern operating theatres in Pakistan.
That same year Sheikh Rashid also reacted to international appeals from aid agencies as the war in Afghanistan forced hundreds of thousands of Afghani civilians to flee. An unexpected wave of refugees had begun pouring into Peshawar in Pakistan over the freezing winter months. Media reports indicated that thousands might perish in freezing conditions. Sheikh Rashid scrambled his government to react and within fifty-six hours of hearing of the emergency, a plane had left Dubai International Airport, filled with tonnes of supplies, including food, blankets, tents and winter clothing. Others followed.
While the Dubai government had an established plan and budget for foreign aid, this incident sums up Sheikh Rashid’s personal approach. It was much the same in July 1985 when, in response to the global Live Aid appeal for the starving millions of Africa, the Dubai government donated £1 million to the fund, administered by Irish rock star Bob Geldof. This was the largest single donation to the Live Aid effort, which prompted the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to say, in a media release, that the leadership of Sheikh Rashid and his sons “provided the world with an admirable example. Their action proves their belief in the common destiny of all people on earth and their effective support for the concept of humanitarian assistance from people to people, irrespective of race, colour or creed.”
Further positive press reports were to highlight Sheikh Rashid’s generosity in 1984, when he made a gift of £750,000 to the University of Exeter in Great Britain. Exeter had long maintained close ties with the Gulf and was a leader in contemporary Arab research. The university’s new £4 million library, including its Rashid Building, was opened by Britain’s HRH Princess Anne and UAE Ambassador to Great Britain, Mahdi Al Tajir, in June 1984.
If these were the best-publicised donations, they were by no means the total of the donations emanating from the coffers of the Dubai government, or privately from the Al Maktoum family. Typically of Sheikh Rashid, the majority were kept low key.
By the end of the 1970s some of Sheikh Rashid’s more controversial projects were beginning to come on line. In July 1979, he symbolically opened the already functioning Jebel Ali Port, a facility whose sheer size and cost to the state was still troubling many of those in the Dubai government.
The largest man-made port in the world, Jebel Ali initially encompassing some seventy thousand square metres of warehousing and eight hundred and fifty thousand square metres of uncovered areas. It had taken nearly three years to create, transforming twenty-five acres of desert and requiring the excavation of one hundred and sixty million cubic yards of sand, gravel and stone. Aside from being one of only two man-made structures on earth which can be seen from the moon — the other being the Great Wall of China — it was certainly a working port, but the Dh6.2 billion ($3 billion) project still suffered from an impression among outsiders that it was a lame duck.
Over subsequent months shipping into Jebel Ali Port did indeed increase, a fact undoubtedly boosted by the Dubai government’s visionary, if almost completely unexpected, next move.
One had to go back early eighty years to the turn of the century and the rule of Sheikh Maktoum bin Hasher to pinpoint the moment when Dubai was first set on course to becoming the trading capital of the Gulf. In 1901 Sheikh Hasher had sought to capitalise on the imminent fall of Lingah, on the Iranian coast, by effectively declaring Dubai a free trade zone. His masterful tactic stole the initiative from under the noses of his neighbours and the bulk of the Lower Gulf’s merchant community set up shop in Dubai.
In May 1980, Sheikh Rashid took a leaf from his grandfather’s book in what was at the time a truly bold move. He signed a decree establishing a Free Trade Zone at Jebel Ali, adding to the port a major trade and industry zone, eventually extending to some seven thousand five hundred acres. In the decades leading up the millennium, the site had become one of the biggest in the region, administered by the Jebel Ali Free Zone Authority, a corporate body formed by the Ruler on January 9, 1985.
But even then Sheikh Rashid could not have envisaged the reasons that would help propel Jebel Ali into the number one destination for shipping in the Gulf. Throughout 1979 and 1980 tensions between the new Iranian government in Tehran and the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussain were on the rise. On September 9 and 10, 1980, Iraq claimed to have “liberated” two small areas of previously Iranian territory between Naft-e Shah and Qasr-e Sherin. Later in the month, Iraqi troops made incursions into Iran. Several Iranian airfields were targeted by the Iraqi air force. The following day Iran, having earlier called up all military reservists, responded by bombing a number of military and key economic targets, its first response in a war of attrition which was to rage for eight long and divisive years.
The bloody conflict between these two regional powers had inevitable consequences for the whole Gulf. Trade was badly hit, the conflict taking little time in reaching Gulf waters when the two states fought a desperate battle for the Iranian port of Khoramshahr, just two months after the beginning of hostilities. International vessels were clearly at risk in the ‘Higher Gulf’ area, if not directly targeted by the combatants, and seamen were being asked to work in increasingly dangerous waters. Insurance rates went sky-high. When shipping companies were forced to look for an alternative, only one port in the Lower Gulf enjoyed the spare capacity and facilities to cope — Jebel Ali. The port’s business took off during the early years of the Iran-Iraq War and by the time hostilities ended, in 1988, the Dubai facility was fully established and growing.
Under instructions from Sheikh Rashid in 1975, an industrial zone next to Jebel Ali saw the development of Dubai Aluminium Company (DUBAL) at an initial cost of $800 million. Today DUBAL is one of the world’s leading aluminium producers and a major foreign currency earner for the state. Excess heat from the aluminium making process is channelled to a major desalination plant, which produces some twenty-five million gallons of pure water every day. Near DUBAL is the $400 million Dubai Gas Plant (DUGAS) which is today one of the Gulf’s major industrial operations having being established by a charter issued by the Dubai Ruler in 1977. That same year he ordered the formation of the $22 million Dubai Cable Company (DUCAB) in the same area.
Born hurriedly from the turmoil of British withdrawal ‘East of Aden’ and having survived a decade of acute instability in the Middle East, by the late 1970s the UAE had begun to stand the test of the time. The seven sheikhdoms had functioned well within the loose federal structure, gains had been made, sustainable development achieved. From the outset sceptics had called the UAE a marriage of convenience, destined for messy divorce. They were wrong.
On November 27, 1976, the Supreme Council had re-elected Sheikh Zayed and Sheikh Rashid as President and Vice-President respectively for a second five-year term.
Naturally there were issues that needed to be tackled. During late 1978 the Federal National Council (FNC) and Council of Ministers released a memorandum highlighting a partial paralysis within the federal government. The joint report focused on the seven-member Supreme Council (on which each of the seven Rulers served), the UAE’s highest legislature. Power had devolved only in carefully measured parts, the Supreme Council retaining most effective executive powers. The UAE’s highest body met only infrequently, however, and this had created a bottleneck of unresolved legislation, policy matters and budget issues.
The FNC and Council of Ministers met on February 13, 1979 to debate the matter, producing an eleven-point consultation document to be put before the Supreme Council. This was a radical policy proposal, which proposed to draw the UAE’s constituents into an all-embracing federal structure. This included the common pooling of natural resources, unification of the armed forces and a ban of the purchase of arms other than those bought by a common defence force.
Dubai’s formal response to this came privately from Sheikh Rashid. The Dubai and federal administrations had been at odds the previous year when Dubai had intended to allow the US Navy limited basing rights at its ports. Sheikh Rashid also appeared to believe that the process of integration was moving at a fast enough pace among the UAE’s constituents.
It has also been recorded by some historians that Sheikh Rashid objected to the appointment of Sheikh Sultan bin Zayed Al Nahyan as head of the UAE armed forces. In fact, the opposite was true. “Sheikh Rashid encouraged Sheikh Sultan’s appointment — that is the reality,” says Humaid bin Drai, one of the Ruler’s closest confidants. “Sheikh Rashid liked Sheikh Sultan immensely and felt him capable of heading the armed forces. Privately he told Sheikh Zayed just that.”
The Supreme Council was convened to discuss internal federal policy. Several emirates, along with Dubai, spoke against what was interpreted as a rejection of the existing federal structure in favour of the formation of a larger, all encompassing state. Sheikh Rashid and his government supported further, measured integration of common services such as health, communications, immigration and civil aviation. He distanced himself from those proposing a single entity, judging that the seven constituent emirates remained at far differing levels of socio-economic development.
Dubai, some said, was altogether too independently minded. But in an interview with the Kuwait Daily News, Sheikh Rashid responded to this accusation. “The success of our programmes will render prosperity for Dubai and to our people all over the union. The prosperity of Dubai, in the final analysis, is prosperity for all the emirates of the UAE,” he said. On suggestions of a reshuffle within the UAE government he said: “Our policy is to encourage educated elements who are ready to work and sacrifice for the welfare of the union.”
He also believed that at a time of particular upheaval elsewhere in the region — the Shah of Iran had been all but swept away by the Islamic Revolution, the US Embassy in Tehran had just been sacked with dozens of hostages taken and Egypt and Israel were preparing to sign their controversial peace accord at Camp David in America the following month — the UAE did not need a period of uncertainty.
However, the Supreme Council was split on the issue of further integration and after two days of talks the Rulers left Abu Dhabi without reaching a firm decision. This constitutional crisis would ultimately test the commitment of the seven member states to the United Arab Emirates. Over subsequent weeks the Rulers worked to build a consensus, while Kuwait sent its Foreign Minister, Sheikh Sabah al Ahmed al Jabar al Sabah engaged in a round of shuttle diplomacy among the emirates.
By early April a picture began to form of a UAE which was to be allowed to grow together at its own pace. The London-based Independent later wrote: “Sheikh Zayed of Abu Dhabi had apparently come to realise that the federation could only be saved by giving Sheikh Rashid a greater stake in it…”
The Dubai Ruler emerged as the candidate to take on the portfolio of Prime Minister, a role in which he could oversee integration at a pace which he and Sheikh Zayed both considered manageable. On April 25, 1979, the UAE government resigned. In addition to his role as Vice-President, Sheikh Rashid was installed as Prime Minister and formed a new administration, directing this in a familiar and well-trodden direction. The Independent wrote: “Sheikh Rashid’s prime-ministerial philosophy immediately became evident; he revived the economy.” Britain’s Daily Telegraph later wrote: “He then helped strengthen the union by backing development projects in the poorer emirates… In his heyday the sheikh was a dynamic, active Ruler.”
Dubai-based businessman Khalifa Juma Al Naboodah recalls that period. “The UAE was not working as it needed to at the time. Sheikh Rashid took on the role of Prime Minister as it enabled him to directly push the ministries in a direction which would strengthen the union. The UAE was in part his creation and he knew exactly what was now needed to evolve the Emirates further.”
The year 1979 was a special year personally for Sheikh Rashid. The UAE government formed under his Prime Ministership was performing well, the federation was functioning at its best and its constituents were visibly better aligned than ever before.
At home, Dubai was booming. The 1970s had been kind to his emirate. The infrastructure that Sheikh Rashid had put in place during the 1960s was ready to serve the city-state when oil receipts began to rise. With that head start, Dubai has spent the 1970s in a furious pace of development. By 1979, many of the grandest projects ever to be undertaken in the Middle East were coming on line. Jebel Ali Port was awaiting inauguration, as were Dubai Dry Docks. Both were completed during the mid-part of the year, ahead of a special event in the annual calendar, and one much anticipated by Sheikh Rashid himself.
Since their June 1961 meeting at a Buckingham Palace garden party, Sheikh Rashid and Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II had struck up a friendship. On that occasion a scheduled ‘introduction’ had extended to a twenty-minute discussion. Sheikh Rashid subsequently met the Queen for an official banquet during his State Visit to the United Kingdom in July 1969. During the intervening period they had stayed in contact and Sheikh Rashid had visited Buckingham Palace privately several times, the Queen promising to reciprocate when her programme allowed.
Queen Elizabeth was to make her long-anticipated visit to the UAE in 1979, during which she inaugurated the new Dubai Municipality building, adjacent to the Creek, Jebel Ali Port and Dubai Dry Dock. Queen Elizabeth’s visit lasted several days, including a Sunday when, as head of the Church of England, the Queen traditionally attends services wherever she is. In Dubai, she planned to attend Holy Trinity Church.
“Out of courtesy, Sheikh Rashid insisted on taking Queen Elizabeth to church personally,” recalls Humaid bin Drai, then Head of Protocol. “It was an extraordinary display of friendship. The Ruler’s car stopped near the entrance of the church and Sheikh Rashid got out to escort Queen Elizabeth up some stairs and to the church door.”
On another occasion during the visit, Sheikh Rashid was escorting the Queen around work in progress on the second phase of development at Port Rashid when the workforce began a quite unexpected show of support for the Dubai Ruler.
“Naturally work on the site was interrupted, although all the staff were on site,” recalls property developer Zakariah Doleh, who joined the party. “Suddenly they started singing ‘For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow’ in the direction of Sheikh Rashid. He was embarrassed personally, but nevertheless it was a testimony to his popularity.”
Later that year Sheikh Rashid was himself on the road, travelling to the Sultanate of Oman for an official visit. He flew from Dubai to Muscat on September 16, and immediately drove to Sultan Qaboos’s majestic Al Rabat Palace in Salalah for a round of talks. It was a time of heightened political tension around the Middle East. Across the Gulf, in Iran, the Shah’s regime had been swept away by the Iranian Revolution, while in Iraq Saddam Hussain had gained power. Tensions between the two were escalating, prompting Sultan Qaboos to sent emissaries seeking to ensure protection for international shipping using the Straits of Hormuz, the southern coast of which is Omani territory.
Dubai’s Ruler stayed in the Sultanate for three days touring Salalah and several development projects, including Oman’s award winning Arzat experimental vegetable farm. Most important, over several sessions with Sultan Qaboos the Rulers strengthened their own ties and built a broad policy consensus on the issues of the day.
“The meeting between Sultan Qaboos and myself has shown that relations between the UAE and Oman are very good and will continue to improve,” said Sheikh Rashid. “It had given us the opportunity to acquaint ourselves with the outstanding achievements in Oman under the wise leadership of Sultan Qaboos bin Said.”
What no one could control, however, was the worsening situation between Iran and Iraq. By September 1980 vocal attacks had given away to military skirmishing and later the same year all-out war had started. In a rapidly worsening situation, the conflict constantly threatened to escalate to include other Gulf states.
The UAE worked tirelessly to seek peace between the protagonists, while itself studiously maintaining neutrality. This was a war of which there was no accurate picture, both governments releasing contradictory information on the state of the war. This left pertinent questions to be answered on the subject of public reportage on the Iran-Iraq War.
“Sheikh Rashid knew it was important to be impartial and not offend either side,” recalls Humaid bin Drai. “He personally called Dubai Radio to instruct them to broadcast both versions of the news, those released by the Iranians and the Iraqis.”
By the beginning of 1981, Sheikh Rashid was probably happier than at any time in his sixty-nine years. The United Arab Emirates, a union which he played an important part in creating, was almost a decade old and thriving. Dubai was riding high on a wave of petro-dollar induced prosperity and beginning to emerge as a modern entity. Its success was founded and, at this point, driven by the infrastructure projects that Sheikh Rashid had set about putting in place from the 1960s.
His sons had followed him into office and held key portfolios within the government, carrying forward Sheikh Rashid’s vision of the larger state. Dubai Crown Prince Sheikh Maktoum was Deputy Prime Minister of the UAE, Sheikh Hamdan was Minister of Finance and Industry and Sheikh Mohammed was Minister of Defence. Sheikh Ahmed was Head of Dubai’s Central Military Command. Each was continuing the legacy of their father in some way, while also managing the affairs of Dubai in the shape set out a generation before.
“Sheikh Rashid was proud of his boys. He had worked at a blistering pace for decades. By the time he was in his seventies he was watching his sons take on an increasing role in Dubai and the UAE, in the knowledge that, although they were four independently minded men, they were going to continue the work which he began,” recalls Hamad bin Sukat.
At sixty-nine years of age, Sheikh Rashid continued to maintain a tight schedule of meetings and commitments. On February 7, 1981 he visited Pakistan, along with Sheikh Hamdan and Sheikh Mohammed, for talks with Pakistani President General Mohammed Zia ul-Haq and, the following month visited Britain for a short holiday, interrupting this to involve himself in a chemical waste dumping scare in Umm Al Qaiwain and Ras Al Khaimah.
Returning home he continued on a taxing round of engagements, among them meeting a delegation from the Palestinian Liberation Organisation and senior ministers from the Philippines and Bangladesh, among others, all during April. At the end of the month, he toured parts of the Creek and ordered the Municipality to draw up plans to shift all industrial installations to specially designated ‘industrial zones’ outside of the city. There were also hectic behind-the-scenes negotiations going on toward the formulation of a pan-Gulf body, a concept on which Sheikh Rashid had constantly touched with his associates across the region. As early as June 13, 1973 he told reporters: “The economy is of such importance that we have to look not just on a local level, but a regional level, to secure stability. I would like to see the UAE as part of a wider Gulf Arab organisation, perhaps on the lines of the Common Market in Europe.”
The Iran-Iraq War had underlined the need for just such a grouping and in May 1981 it became a reality when the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia established the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). As Sheikh Rashid had envisaged nearly a decade earlier, the GCC sought to boost cooperation in economics, industry, agriculture, transport and communications, energy, defence and external relations.
One of the most important diplomatic events of the year in the UAE was the visit of Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi between May 11 and 13. Mrs Gandhi had often conferred with Sheikh Rashid by telephone and her visit was in response to a personal invitation from him. He insisted on hosting a banquet for the Indian Prime Minister during her visit, and on May 9 honoured his ally at a banquet attended by two hundred community leaders at the Ambassador Hotel in Bur Dubai.
In many ways, this poignant occasion showed Sheikh Rashid at his best. “Although they were speaking through an interpreter, he and Mrs Gandhi were noticeably engrossed in conversation during the entire time they sat together,” recalls L R Lulla, owner of the Ambassador. “Since the Ambassador opened in 1969, Sheikh Rashid had often staged banquets at our hotel for visiting dignitaries. He was always charming, but I remember thinking that he must have liked Mrs Gandhi. His eyes that evening were glowing and he was smiling contentedly in that way of his which lit up his face. As usual, he himself only ate little and drank orange juice sparingly.”
The dinner over, Mrs Gandhi left for her hotel at 11pm. Sheikh Rashid, though looking tired and a little drawn at the end of the evening, thanked management at the hotel profusely for a job well done, as was his custom, before departing for Za’abeel Palace. This was the last time he was to be seen in public for some time.
Over the next few days it seems that Sheikh Rashid began to feel more tired than normal, although for a man of his age, fulfilling a tight and demanding schedule, few would have wondered. He decided a short break was in order and travelled with several friends by car to Hatta, an enclave of Dubai in the Hajar Mountains, which was always a favourite with Sheikh Rashid. He retreated to his palace at Hatta several times a year and was normally refreshed, but on this occasion the following week saw little improvement from what was suspected to be a virus. The Ruler felt generally unwell.
With work mounting up back in the city, he reluctantly decided to return to Dubai. It was during this journey, of less than two hours, that Sheikh Rashid’s health suddenly worsened. He was physically sick several times and arrived in Dubai pale and evidently suffering from much more than a virus. His health worsened. The following morning, a stroke had been diagnosed.
It is an unwritten rule observed by all ruling and royal families throughout the world that a public face is maintained as a matter of course, while personal matters remain private. In the Middle East, privacy is everything, especially when it comes to illness. Among the Arabs, any form of sickness of those in power is treated with utmost secrecy. This, of course, was a necessity in less settled times when a leader’s illness could provide an opening for those who sought to gain power by force.
Well loved and widely respected, Sheikh Rashid was a public person: He made himself accessible to his people and was seen in their midst nearly every day. News of his illness was carried far from the centre of the Ruler’s court. Within a day the whole of Dubai had heard rumours that all was not well, and in days the truth was widely known, even if it was unconfirmed through official channels.
“It was quite a shock as Sheikh Rashid became ill suddenly and without warning. Until then he was as strong as ever,” recalls Hamad Bin Sukat.
This strength may have helped him through the stroke. Sheikh Rashid was conscious and — crucial for long-term prospects for recovery — soon after the stroke could communicate clearly with doctors and family members. Despite his advancing age, which inevitably would mean that he would take time to recover, it was indications like this that he retained all his mental faculties that gave rise to hope.
In the days and weeks which followed, Crown Prince Sheikh Maktoum took on much of his father’s schedule, while the family continued to mount a vigil over its patriarch. And, indeed, within ten days there was firm progress. Sheikh Rashid was able to take telephone calls from UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan and several members of the UAE Supreme Council, all seeking news of his recovery.
As news spread of their father’s illness, Sheikh Maktoum, Sheikh Hamdan, Sheikh Mohammed and Sheikh Ahmed fielded calls from leaders all over the world. Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, who had shared such a warm relationship with Sheikh Rashid over the years, requested that she be kept informed of his progress.
“Within only a few weeks we were happy to see Sheikh Rashid showing good progress. His appetite, although never great, was returning and as he grew stronger we were able to sit and talk for long periods, just like before,” said Bin Sukat.
Khalifa Al Naboodah recalled: “He looked that healthy at times, it was hard to think that he was technically still ill. Being Sheikh Rashid, he was unable to rest his mind, constantly inquiring from everyone about the progress of projects and news of what was happening in his city.”
On June 20, Sheikh Rashid was well enough to fly to Britain for treatment at Wellington Hospital in London. The following day British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher visited him at his London residence, during which the two discussed relations between their countries and the political situation in the Gulf.
After returning to his home, during August Sheikh Rashid took a short private tour of Britain, Spain and the United States, while he was back in London again in September for further visit to the Wellington. Following that visit, the hospital’s director issued a statement saying that “Sheikh Rashid is improving remarkably. He showed great progress even within two weeks of treatment.”
Sheikh Rashid was always keen to get back to his home and as summer cooled into autumn he became increasingly active again, albeit staying in the relative privacy of his palace. On November 7, Sheikh Zayed travelled to Za’abeel Palace to call on his friend, Vice-President and Prime Minister. Sheikh Zayed’s visit proved a watershed in Sheikh Rashid’s recovery; although he was still a little frail, he began to insist on a thorough briefing of affairs of state.
The following day, in Abu Dhabi, the Rulers of Abu Dhabi and Dubai were both re-elected by the Supreme Council as President and Vice-President respectively, for a third five-year term. Deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Maktoum represented his father. Sheikh Hamdan, who held the key UAE Finance and Industry portfolio, was also present.
During 1982 and early 1983 there was considerable hope within the Al Maktoum family and the close-knit inner circle. Sheikh Rashid’s strength appeared to be returning. “He was almost back to being the normal Sheikh Rashid, although a little greyer in the beard. The doctors were delighted with his progress,” said Hamad Bin Sukat, perhaps the only man to have visited his friend every day during the dark days following the Ruler’s stroke. “He was anxious to go out more and see what developments were going on in the city. Mentally he was often still sharp as a knife.”
By mid-1982 Sheikh Rashid was following developments closely once again. On May 9 he braved high temperatures to visit Margham 1, a promising new onshore oil and gas field, just off the Dubai-Hatta road.
On June 19 he made his first full public appearance during the inauguration of five new road underpasses in the centre of Dubai, built at a cost of Dh300 million. Travelling by car, he toured the tunnels as a symbolic gesture. Sheikh Rashid had, indeed, gone a touch grey, as the crowds that lined the streets could see. But as his car crossed the city, the mood of the population was captured by the spontaneous displays of affection. Sheikh Rashid’s appearance had been widely publicised in the press and by 4.30pm, a full thirty minutes before he was due to appear, shops and offices all over the city closed. His route was easily visible, as the roads had been cleared and closed by police. For most of the way the streets were lined with people of all nationalities, all social groups.
Promptly, as was his way, Sheikh Rashid’s car appeared at the appointed time from Za’abeel Palace and slowly made its way to the centre of the city. It was a remarkable scene, a genuine outpouring of affection in which he was greeted with cheers and applause virtually the entire route. In an emotional afternoon, the city turned out to applaud its creator, perhaps even to mark the occasion it got him back.
“Sheikh Rashid was, I suppose, a little bemused,” recalls Bin Sukat. “He never liked a fuss and here were a great many people from his city lining his route. He was moved.”
A few weeks later, during August, Sheikh Rashid made a further public outing, visiting the Jebel Ali industrial zone, including the aluminium smelter, port and water desalination plant.
He also went on a short private visit to West Germany in September 1982, accompanied by Sheikh Mohammed.
During that year, Sheikh Rashid had continued his recovery and gradually appeared more often in public. At the beginning of December he gave a rare press interview to Dir Al Watan magazine, to mark the occasion of the UAE’s eleventh National Day.
“I feel great joy to see the UAE people united in one state to achieve its hopes and aspirations in its march towards general progress and advancement in all aspects of its economic, social and political life,” he said.
His health made further progress, and he travelled to London and later the United States for treatment. The United States government organised appointments with the best doctors in that country, in both Chicago and Houston.
However despite Sheikh Rashid’s own recovery, tragedy befell the Al Maktoum family again. In May 1983, Sheikha Latifa, wife of the Ruler, was in London for medical treatment when she passed away. Early on May 18, the Ruler’s office in Dubai broke the news of the tragedy when it announced to the media: “With our hearts full of grief for what Almighty God had ordained, the Court of HH Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum announces the death of Sheikha Latifa bint Hamdan bint Zayed Al Nahyan yesterday. May her soul rest in peace and God console our hearts for the grave loss.”
Unusually for a woman who played her role from the background, full state mourning was accorded to Sheikha Latifa. National flags were lowered to half mast, seven days of mourning were ordered, UAE Embassies the world over were closed for three days and all public engagements cancelled.
The shock felt within the community seems to have been palpable, to the extent that the English daily Khaleej Times reported ten thousand mourners attended the last rights.
Sheikh Rashid was devastated. His beloved wife of forty-four years torn from him, the stinging grief of his loss was almost too much to bear. “He loved Sheikha Latifa dearly and was hurting like I had never seen,” recalls Bin Sukat. “In around forty years of knowing Sheikh Rashid, this was the only time that I ever saw him cry. He loved her so much.”
Hundreds of citizens and expatriates offered their personal condolences to Sheikh Rashid and his sons. UAE President Sheikh Zayed and the Rulers of Sharjah, Ras Al Khaimah, Ajman and Fujairah called on them at Za’abeel Palace. The Iranian Deputy Prime Minister, Mirza Taheri, flew in to pay his respects, as did the Qatari Foreign Minister and representatives of the Rulers of Kuwait and Oman.
The death of Sheikha Latifa was a blow to her husband. Hamad bin Sukat recalls that it took several months before Sheikh Rashid seemed to return to normal, adding: “I’m sure it was never my imagination, but he never seemed quite the same.”
Although his health was improving, Sheikh Rashid never did return to his public visibility of old. He insisted on following developments, but by the mid-1980s was content to devolve a great deal of power to his well-proven sons. This said, he remained active in some areas of personal interest.
In May 1984, for instance, he brought together a meeting, which included Sheikh Mohammed and a number of senior ministers, to approve initial plans for a rehabilitation centre for the aged and disabled in Dubai. A report of the meeting indicates that Sheikh Rashid intended to bear the cost of development and construction from his private funds. On the international front, during this time he also donated $2.4 million to build a student complex at the Palestinian Beir Zeit University in the Occupied West Bank.
Freed somewhat from his heavy schedule, he also holidayed more. He visited Pakistan three times in 1984. A man with little time for himself previously, he also took a close interest in camel racing for the first time and visited Dubai’s Nad Al Sheba Camel Racetrack on numerous occasions.
Most of the UAE’s Rulers also took trouble to visit Dubai, while in May 1985 Pakistan President General Mohammed Zia ul-Haq and his family flew into Dubai especially to pay a private call on Sheikh Rashid. “I had not seen him for a while and he has not been keeping well,” General Zia told the media. “Sheikh Rashid has pioneered an excellent relationship with Pakistan and I pray to God to give him good health.”
When the situation required his input, Sheikh Rashid was not slow to set aside his own condition. There were problems to contend with when relations between Ras Al Khaimah and the neighbouring Sultanate of Oman suddenly worsened in late 1988. Ras Al Khaimah and Oman shared a long, rugged and woefully ill-defined border that was the cause of mounting tensions between Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammed Al Qasimi and Sultan Qaboos bin Said of Oman. For a time in early 1989 it seemed that either could move to escalate the crisis. Several efforts at mediation failed and when the situation suddenly worsened, Sheikh Rashid, as UAE Vice-President and Prime Minister, stepped into the fray.
“Sheikh Rashid called on Sheikh Saqr and told him that he would work to resolve the situation peaceably,” recalls Khalifa Al Naboodah, a close advisor and friend of Sheikh Rashid who was present during the crisis.
His intervention could not have come at a more crucial juncture. The UAE was positioned as one of the most politically moderate states in the Gulf, one that enjoyed dialogue with all the many sides of the Middle Eastern landscape. Its position, though an asset, would have been under threat had relations with Oman worsened, especially as the Sultanate was a close American ally and recipient of US economic and military aid.
Within the UAE government there probably could have been no better mediator, judging from the close relations that Sheikh Rashid kept with Sultan Qaboos. “Sheikh Rashid did not simply get involved to wash his hands of the affair when negotiating got difficult. He spent a great deal of time mediating, bringing the two sides together, helped by the fact that Sultan Qaboos and he had extremely good personal relations,” recalls Humaid bin Drai.
In time, the positions of both Ras Al Khaimah and Oman softened, allowing the start of broad-based discussions which all but settled the matter. On April 8, 1989 a spokesman for the Prime Minister’s office issued a statement saying that the UAE and Oman had agreed to negotiate a formula for re-demarcation of the border.
This was far from the only arbitration in which Sheikh Rashid had been involved. Indeed, as late as 1981 Dubai showed its own commitment to negotiation and diplomacy when finally settling the ongoing border questions with Sharjah. When peaceful local talks had failed, both parties agreed to put the matter in the hands of an international tribunal, which finally settled the matter following three years of deliberation.
The turn of the decade saw Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, Ruler of Dubai, turn seventy-eight. His features, always craggy, had begun to look aged. Although his mind was often still as sharp as ever, his body was giving out on him. He seldom ventured into public and had come to rely on friends and family for news.
From Za’abeel Palace he loved to sit and watch the city go by. The nearby Dubai World Trade Centre, Hilton Hotel and busy Dubai-Abu Dhabi Road offered something of a comfort. In the distance he could also see much of the Bur Dubai quarter and the city centre bristling with construction cranes, evidence of the continuing boom. To someone who had been something of a workaholic throughout his life, Sheikh Rashid often found his forced inactivity frustrating. To a man who could always see unfinished business, it was maddening.
“I visited Sheikh Rashid nearly every day and the first thing he would always ask was for news. His appetite for information was still insatiable,” recalls Hamad Bin Sukat. “We would sit and talk about the old times, or he would tell me of his hopes for Dubai in the future.”
During late summer Sheikh Rashid was comfortable, although at times he was notably distant. Hamad Bin Sukat would visit for a couple of hours during the afternoon, during which time they would sit and talk. As was his routine, on October 7 Bin Sukat paid his usual afternoon visit. He left promising that he would return the following day. Sheikh Rashid smiled and waved him to go saying: “Inshallah.”
Later that evening, without warning, he weakened. At 10 pm on Sunday, October 7, 1990, Dubai’s greatest leader passed away.
Epilogue
In the hours and days which followed the announcement of Sheikh Rashid’s death, tributes poured in from all over the world. “Sheikh Rashid left behind immortal accomplishments,” said UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. Jordan’s King Hussain stated: “I will remember him all my life. He discharged his responsibilities to Arabs and the Islamic world with great credibility.”
None would comfort all those, great and small, who keenly felt the loss of the father of Dubai.
On the evening of October 7, 1990, Sheikh Rashid close friend Hamad Bin Sukat was at home when the telephone rang. “Sheikh Mohammed called to tell me that Sheikh Rashid had died. It was a shock and I was in something of a panic. I had to sit down,” he recalls. “Few people in Dubai had ever known a time when Sheikh Rashid was not around. I could not believe that he had finally gone.” A policeman arrived at Bin Sukat’s home, moments later, to escort him to the palace.
The news spread quickly, and just as quickly it became apparent that the sorrow and sense of loss was felt throughout the community, transcending all bounds of race and creed.
Indian business leader G B Choitram Jethwani had known Sheikh Rashid for well over thirty years. Like many, he had known of the Ruler’s worsening condition, but when telephoned at home with news of his death, was unprepared. “I had tears in my eyes. I don’t think I exaggerate when I say it was like my own father dying.”
Khalifa Al Naboodah said: “Sheikh Rashid was like a father to everyone. He had a great affection for everyone — locals, Europeans and Asians — and was loved in return by the people. “I heard at around 9.30pm and didn’t really know what to do. It took people days to grasp what had happened.”
Before daybreak the following day thousands of bewildered and stunned people from all sections of the community were gathered close to the Ruler’s Mosque at Za’abeel Palace. This crowd grew as news spread; more workers arrived after having found their places of work throughout Dubai shuttered and closed as a mark of respect for Sheikh Rashid.
Around 10.30am the funeral cortege emerged from Za’abeel Palace and the procession of vehicles made slow progress toward Umm Hurair Cemetery in Bur Dubai. Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid drove the vehicle that carried his father’s body, while UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan led mourners in the car behind.
In addition to an estimated eight thousand people near Za’abeel Palace, thousands thronged the streets along the route. Most watched quietly; others, heads bowed, prayed for the late Ruler.
Within fifteen minutes the cortege arrived at Umm Hurair Cemetery, where more thousands watched as Sheikh Rashid’s body, wrapped tightly in a plain white shroud, was smoothly carried to its final resting place. Directing proceedings were Sheikh Hamdan and Sheikh Mohammed. Both helped to lift their father’s body and place it into a freshly dug grave, after which they paused as Quranic verses were read aloud.
That day, and those that were to follow, were low key as leaders of all sections of society offered condolences. There was none of the pomp which Sheikh Rashid so despised throughout his lifetime, but at the same time thousands took the opportunity to pay their respects to a man who was remarkable in so many ways.
Speaking on behalf of the Supreme Council, UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan commented: “His memory will not be forgotten. He was in the lead of those who gave to their country and people.”
Tributes came from all over the world, British Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd stating: “History will remember him as one of the greatest leaders in the Gulf and a man who spent his life for his people and his country.” US Secretary of State James Baker cabled the new Ruler, Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, to say: “The UAE’s loss of a great statesman like your father is a great sadness.”
Sheikh Maktoum was in Britain when his father died but hurriedly returned, arriving to find a city still paralysed by shock. He made his way immediately to Za’abeel Palace where hundreds of people were waiting to offer their condolences. As Dubai’s new Ruler, Sheikh Maktoum and his brothers Sheikh Hamdan, Sheikh Mohammed and Sheikh Ahmed received Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad Al Thani, Emir of Qatar, and Sheikh Isa bin Sulman Al-Khalifa, Emir of Bahrain, along with representatives of governments around the world.
The UAE federal government announced an official forty-day mourning period, ordered UAE missions abroad to shut their doors and closed federal ministries for six days. Throughout the Emirates the private sector also marked the passing of the architect of the UAE, with schools, businesses, banks and many shops staying closed for several days.
While Sheikh Rashid’s death was greatly mourned on a national level, the level of international reaction underlined the respect and admiration for him in countries worldwide. The Al-Maktoum family received tributes to its head, but what was quite unexpected was the depth of feeling which motivated many in the region to break with tradition in marking the death of a foreign statesman. Both Qatar and Pakistan announced three days of official mourning, while the Omani and Bahraini governments announced that flags would be flown at half-mast.
The death of Dubai’s leader was reported in length in the international media. On October 9, Britain’s newspapers carried full-page obituaries. The Daily Telegraph informed readers that Sheikh Rashid “led his pocket-sized Gulf emirate to an unprecedented prosperity based not only on oil but also on trade… His maverick behaviour was often at odds with Arab political orthodoxy, but his Bedouin simplicity never failed to charm all who met him. His modest two-storey office by Dubai Creek and his way of life were a model of restraint at a time where other rulers were engaged in an oil-fuelled spending spree.”
The Independent dubbed him “the merchant prince” and recalled that he “made it his life’s work to turn the already cosmopolitan trading post he inherited in 1958 into the prosperous city-state the world knows today… Sheikh Rashid leaves behind a Dubai that far outclasses any other Middle Eastern city as a place to live and do business and that bears comparison with Hong Kong and Singapore, its economy restimulated by the current surge in oil prices.”
Agence France Presse observed, “Sheikh Rashid leaves behind Dubai’s business prosperity at a state which now puts it as a strong candidate to take over Hong Kong’s position in world trade in the 21st Century.”
Most extraordinary, however, was the reaction across the Atlantic in New York, at the United Nations. The General Assembly was debating a motion on Palestine when invited to mark the passing of Dubai’s leader. Both General Assembly and Security Council observed a minute’s silence, after which representatives of Kuwait, Poland and the US paid tribute to Sheikh Rashid.
Though scarcely a whisper marked his birth in 1912 at a place of which few outsiders at the time had even heard, Sheikh Rashid had laboured to develop Dubai and later the United Arab Emirates into a lasting and sustainable entity. Seventy-eight years later, his death drew the world community to its feet in the UN General Assembly, a remarkable tribute to a remarkable man and his undoubtedly remarkable achievements.
Written by Graeme Wilson
http://213.132.44.227/english/dubai/fatherofDubai_epilogue.asp
Sheikh Saqr and the assassination of Sheikh Khalid
In 1965, two years after I left Sharjah, Sheikh Saqr was deposed. It has been suggested it was with British connivance.
The British were probably even then seeking an exit strategy from the gulf and were trying to encourage a federation of the Sheikhdoms which could survive after they had gone. The man most likely to take the lead in this was Sheikh Raschid of Dubai. But the problem was that Sharjah and Dubai had been at loggerheads for centuries, and Sheikh Saqr and his followers were unlikely to accept the hegemony of the ruler of Dubai. It seems likely that this was what led up to the decision that Sheikh Saqr had to go.
A new ruler of Sharjah was quickly appointed. Sheikh Khalid ibn Muhammed al-Qassimi [KHALID III], the young modernist I knew from earlier days, and a staunch friend of Sheikh Raschid of Dubai, who one could say was his mentor.
Sheikh Saqr was banished into exile. For some years he languished in Cairo, but he was not finished. In 1972 he made an unexpected comeback. No one knew he had returned to area, and it took the British completely by surprise when one night a group of armed men led by Sheikh Saqr fought their way into Sharjah Palace and assassinated Khalid.
But Sheikh Saqr's new rule did not last long. The ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Raschid, together with British troops from nearby Oman, once more forced Sheikh Saqr into exile. Yet another new ruler of Sharjah was proclaimed: Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qassimi, brother of the assassinated Sheikh Khalid.
One can only speculate what happened behind the scenes when Sheikh Saqr was originally deposed in 1965. But probably of more significance is what it means for the future. In that region people have long memories. Not everyone is enamoured of the tourist trap that the current leadership is creating at the expense of the traditional Arabic way of life.
THE GULF — Recollections of a British Ex-Pat
Sheikh Saqr ibn Sultan al-Qasimi of Sharjah
Sheikh Saqr
During my stay in Sharjah as an employee of International Aeradio Ltd (IAL) I met both the ruler Sheikh Saqr ibn Sultan al-Qasimi and his successor Sheikh Khalid ibn Muhammed al-Qasimi. Sheikh Saqr was a quiet, reserved individual and I suspect at heart a traditionalist, whereas Sheikh Khalid was very modern young man and much more brash. A colleague of mine was in the habit of simply addressing him as Khalid, and he didn't seem to object. (Although what Sheikh Khalid thought privately is another matter.)
My first meeting with Sheikh Saqr was difficult.
I had returned to the UK for a few weeks to get married, and on Ann and my return to Sharjah we found that my apartment had been burgled and some possessions stolen. It was mainly my own fault as I had been advised to put the possessions in storage at Sharjah Fort during my absence. But as I was to be away for such a short time I ignored the advice. And I was young and rash - ignoring advice was par for the course.
There was no police force in Sharjah and I had no idea what to do. The Manager of IAL Sharjah recommended putting my case before the Sheikh who could launch an investigation. Each morning Sheikh Saqr held court outside the front of his palace, receiving local dignitaries who came to pay their respects, and of course petitioners such as myself. So the next morning I found myself waiting outside the palace for the Sheikh and his entourage to emerge.
In retrospect the IAL high panjandrum should have accompanied me and introduced me to the Sheikh. He had paid his respects to the Sheikh many times, had some official standing, and knew the protocol expected. But like most overseas IAL managers, he was hardly a bundle of energy and being pro-active was not part of his makeup.
I was green. I had only been in the Middle East a few months, and knew little about the culture. At first I hung around the palace door, getting some odd looks from the men who came out carrying chairs which they placed in a line outside the palace. Eventually out came Sheikh Saqr and I made the mistake of trying to speak to him then. But the Sheikh was probably used to dealing with gauche foreigners who didn't know the ropes and politely indicated I should accompany him as he headed for the chairs. A slow and stately process in which I felt distinctly out of place.
Protocol dictated that I should have arrived later, paid my formal respects to the Sheikh, and then have joined the line of other petitioners on the chairs to wait my turn for a personal audience. But the Sheikh was probably keen to get me out of his hair. He immediately indicated I should sit beside him, and after I had explained my problem, provided one of his bodyguards to accompany me into the soukhs to look for the missing goods.
We made our way through the soukhs: an Englishman who hadn't a clue what to do, and a hulking Arab bodyguard complete with ammunition bandolier and a Lee Enfield rifle left over from World War II who knew exactly what to do. Poke about officiously and bully the tradesmen until one of them confessed.
It was clearly getting us nowhere, and when the bodyguard started to bully my houseboy, I called a halt. To hell with the stolen stuff. This was not my idea of a criminal investigation.
My second (very embarrasing) meeting with Sheikh Saqr is related in Ray, oilman, so I won't repeat it here. But it reinforced my view that Sheikh Saqr was a mild mannered individual who would never resort to violence. It just shows how wrong you can be!
Sheikh died after heroin overdose
Terri Judd
THE ELDEST son of the ruler of Sharjah died of a heroin overdose at his family's English country estate, an inquest was told. Sheikh Mohammed bin Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi was found on the floor of his bathroom, surrounded by syringes and a tie strapped as a tourniquet around his arm.
The ruling family of Sharjah, part of the United Arab Emirates, had guarded details of the 24-year-old prince's death. In keeping with religious practice, his body was flown home within 48 hours. Flags flew at half- mast and newspapers carried a simple paragraph announcing his death. The UAE embassy said he had died of natural causes.
But yesterday his father, Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, was forced to disclose the true reason for his playboy son's end. In a statement to the Eastbourne coroner's court, the sheikh described the moment he found his son's body on 3 April. "My security guard broke the window of the bathroom. I went into the bathroom and I found him on his knees on the bathroom floor." Detective Sergeant Roger Sealey of Sussex Police told the court that a syringe was found under the prince's leg. "There was the full paraphernalia of an intravenous drugs user. In the bathroom there were several syringes on the sink and a type of dessert spoon near by." The prince had long been a worry to his father, who had chosen a younger son to succeed as ruler. Thrown out of an Arizona university and unable to settle on any profession, the prince had turned to heroin. The court heard that the young man's father had been aware of his drug habit but was convinced he had weaned himself off it while doing training for the Sharjah police. He had not taken the drug for 18 months. A Home Office pathologist, Dr Iain West, told the coroner the prince could have lost his tolerance of the drug and consequently his habitual dose had proved fatal. He died of opiate intoxication. The father and son had flown to Gatwick the day before for a break at Wych Cross Place, the family's home near East Grinstead. On arrival the prince went to his room. Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi said: "At midday the next day I went and asked my security staff if they had seen my son. His bags were still outside his room." The estate manager, Nicholas Tippett, broke in through the bathroom window but the prince had been dead for several hours. The East Sussex coroner, Alan Craze, in recording a verdict that the prince died of a non-dependent abuse of drugs, said: "Nobody, however privileged and well-educated, is immune to ... drug addiction. He was dicing with death."
Copyright 1999 Newspaper Publishing PLC
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Sharjah Ruler funds UK uni
United Arab Emirates: Wednesday, May 16 - 2007 at 07:20
Sharjah's Ruler bin Mohammad Al Qasimi has made a $20m donation to the University of Exeter for its Arabic and Islamic institute, Gulf News reported. Dr Sheikh Sultan has a PhD from Exeter and has previously funded projects at the university.
Sharjah ruler mourns the death of his brother
WAM
Published: December 10, 2007, 14:49
Sharjah: The court of His Highness Shaikh Sultan Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Sharjah, on Monday mourned the death of his brother Shaikh Saqr Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi.
"With the heart of a true believer, patience and deep grief, the Sharjah Ruler's Court mourns the death of Shaikh Saqr Bin Mohammad Al Qasimi, elder brother of Shaikh Sultan, who passed away on Monday at the age of 73," a statement from the Shajrah Ruler's Court said.
Funeral prayers will be offered at 10am on Tuesday at the King Faisal Mosque in Sharjah. Burial will follow at the Jubail graveyard.
Shaikh Sultan will receive mourners at Al Badee Palace, the statement said.
The Court announced a seven-day official mourning period, during which flags will fly at half-mast from Monday.
| Sharjah Ruler receives director of Sharjah police | |
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Sharjah, Dec. 30th, 2007(WAM)--His Highness Dr Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, UAE Supreme Council member and ruler of Sharjah received here today at his office, director of Sharjah police, Brigadier Humaid Mohammed Al Hudaidi.
Sheikh Sultan underscored the role of police in ensuring security and stability in the country under the wise leadership of President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and Vice President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.
The two officials discussed functions of police and public security in the emirate of Sharjah.
The meeting was attended by Sharjah Crown Prince and Deputy Ruler, Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed bin Sultan Al Qasimi and deputy director of Sharjah police, Colonel Abdullah Mubarak Al Dukhan.
November 15th, 2007
Ruler Of Sharjah Attends Today The Conference Of Life Sciences Organized By Sharjah Tatweer Forum
Abstract:
The keynote speaker Mr. Juan Enriquez is the Chairman and CEO of Biotechonomy, a company that researches and funds startups that are working to develop the promise of the genomic revolution. His book titled ‘As the Future Catches You: How Genomics & Other Forces are Changing Your Life, Work, Health & Wealth" became a global best seller. He has published several key articles and papers including, "Transforming Life, Transforming Business: the Life Science Revolution" and "Life Sciences in Arabic Speaking Countries".
Over the next few decades, manufacturing is expected to undergo a profound change. Advances in biotechnology and allied fields, especially nanotechnology, will reach the level of individual atoms and products will be designed and built to atomically-precise specifications. Sharjah Tatweer Forum (STF) takes special note of the sweeping changes biotechnology brings to economies the world over and wants the Emirate of Sharjah to be a leading force at the dawn of the bio-economy.
nternal documents from the UAE Central Bank in Dubai detail huge money laundering operations in the UAE according to financial industry insiders. Moreover, the Sharjah branch of HSBC Holdings PLC was tied to international arms trafficker Victor Bout, indicted in Belgium for money laundering and named in various UN reports as a chief embargo buster in Africa and Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
American citizen Iqbal Hakim, a native of India, was the chief examiner for the UAE Central Bank. Hakim, yet another whistleblower who has been ignored and mistreated by the Bush administration and threatened by Bush's Persian Gulf potentate friends, discovered a suspicious $343 million per year money flow through an HSBC personal account in Dubai. The transactions were investigated by the FBI and the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement but no prosecutions resulted.
There are deep-seated ties between the Bush-Cheney criminal cartel, key GOP operatives, and the UAE. Significant questions about the oil industry’s ties to the U.S. military-intelligence complex were raised when Michael Trumpower, the owner of Prescott, Arizona-based company Matco, Inc. filed for bankruptcy shortly after George W. Bush's inauguration. In questionable financial moves similar to those of Enron, Matco traded on a lucrative oil concession it was granted for all offshore exploration off the Emirate of Fujairah for unsecured loans for equipment and services. Fujairah, one of the poorest of the emirates, is led by Sheik Hamad bin Mohammed al Sharqi, one of the more fundamentalist Wahhabi Muslims in the UAE leadership. Al Sharqi patronizes the Fujairah Islamic Call and Guidance Center, which has recruited a number of foreign adherents of Wahhabi Islam. These include Filipinos, British, Americans, Russians, and Sri Lankans. Moreover, all their native countries are targets of Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda. In addition, a number of Pakistani nationals who worked at the National Bank of Fujairah were known by international law enforcement to be sympathetic to the Taliban.
Trumpower’s close ties to Sheikh Hamad are only rivaled by his close ties to the CIA. Although he became strapped for cash after his company tanked, Trumpower, like Enron's Kenneth Lay, was a major contributor to the Bush campaign and those of other Republican candidates, including that of powerful House Rules Committee member, Representative Thomas Reynolds of New York. Reynolds was in a prime position to derail any House investigation of the GOP-CIA-oil industry ties.
In the mid-1980s, Trumpower was an associate of Iran-contra figure Oliver North. North claims Trumpower was instrumental in helping to free U.S. hostages in Lebanon. That affair was the heart of the Iran-contra scandal in which several current and former Bush administration officials took part. These include National Security Council Middle East adviser Elliot Abrams, former Defense Department Information Awareness Office chief Admiral (retired) John Poindexter, and Assistant Secretaries of State for Latin American Affairs Otto Reich and Roger Noriega. The old Iran-contra fraternity remains largely intact. In 2000, North and Trumpower jointly appeared at a Republican fundraising dinner in Arizona.
Trumpower was also close to the reigning Emir of Sharjah, who granted the shadowy ex-CIA agent of influence rights to drill in a strip of ocean bordering Fujairah. Sharjah was a major base of operations for Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which used the emirate to smuggle weapons and drugs using Ariana Afghan Airlines security credentials. Sharjah was a base of operations for Viktor Bout’s Air Cess operations, which was accused of running weapons to the Taliban and gun running activities in Africa, especially the Democratic Republic of Congo.
From his base in Sharjah in the Gulf, Bout was servicing Ariana Afghan Airline flights to Kandahar, Afghanistan. These flights were believed to be ferrying weapons and Al Qaeda and Taliban volunteers to Afghanistan and the Clinton National Security Council strongly believed Bout was aiding terrorism. Belgium issued an INTERPOL international arrest warrant for Bout for money laundering and diamond smuggling. Clinton White House counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke wanted an arrest warrant issued for Bout. Gayle Smith, Clinton’s National Security Council Africa bureau chief, along with CIA and British MI-6 agents, kept a wary eye on Bout’s activities in Africa’s conflicts.
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The Bush criminal cartel: fingerprints all over Dubai ports deal
After Bush was inaugurated in 2001, Sharjah police sent a special police unit to Sharjah airport to capture Bout and hand him over to U.S. authorities, but the White House declined. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told U.S. intelligence that when it came to Bout, "look but don’t touch.” After 911, Rice inexplicably called off all operations aimed at Bout. Law enforcement and intelligence agents considered such a move amazing, considering Bout’s direct links to smuggling arms to the Taliban and Al Qaeda, as well as to other areas of the world that were rife with Islamist terrorist groups.
Next door to Sharjah is Dubai, the center of CIA spying in the region, according to U.S. intelligence sources. Dubai’s Dolphin Energy Ltd. was a quarter-owned by Enron before the firm’s collapse. Dolphin’s CEO was UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayed Al Nahayan. Bout was reported by the UN to be using Flying Dolphin Airlines, which operated scheduled flights between Dubai and Kandahar between October 2000 and January 2001, to ship arms to the Taliban. Flying Dolphin was owned by Shaikh Abdullah bin Zayed bin Saqr al Nahayan, a former UAE ambassador to the U.S. and a relative of the President of the UAE, who is also the ruler of Abu Dhabi. Flying Dolphin was registered in Bout’s favorite home base of Liberia although its main office was in Dubai.
In addition, Bout’s Texas-based Air Bas had rights to refuel at U.S. bases in Iraq. One of Bout’s airfreight companies, Airbus, was subcontracted through another firm called Falcon Express of Dubai, by Kellogg, Brown and Root, the subsidiary of Halliburton. Air Bas also had links to Falcon Express.
In July 2001, Osama bin Laden was reported to have received kidney treatment at the American Hospital in Dubai with the blessing of the Dubai and UAE governments. At the time of his hospitalization, Osama Bin Laden was reported by the French newspaper Le Figaro and Radio France International to have been visited on July 12, 2001, by Larry Mitchell, the CIA chief in Dubai who was said to have had close contacts with all the Gulf royal families. Mitchell was reportedly called back to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia on July 15, 2001. The Carlyle Group, with George H. W. Bush, James Baker III, and the Bin Laden family as major principals, bought a 42 percent stake (from a previous 4.9 percent stake) in Le Figaro after the paper on October 31, 2001, reported on the Bin Laden meeting with the CIA station chief in Dubai.
One of Neil Bush’s best friends and advocates in the Middle East is the Emir of Dubai, Shaikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, an individual who often crossed paths with the Taliban and Al Qaeda on his frequent hunting and falconing trips to eastern Afghanistan. In the wake of 911, Rashid, who was the Defense Minister of the United Arab Emirates and then Dubai Crown Prince, said the following, “The United States must not to act in haste, it must give diplomacy and legal means every opportunity before launching a military strike on Afghanistan, it must not rush to accuse people without hard evidence.” The UAE was only one of three countries to recognize the Taliban, which acquiesced to the financing of Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. In October 2001, while visiting Dubai just weeks after 911, Neil Bush praised the Shaikh Rashid as a man with “foresight and vision.” In the same speech, Neil Bush said something that should chill the bones of every American--he said the following about his learning-disabled son Pierce, “My father was the 41st president and my brother is 43rd. I think that if Pierce finishes high school, he’ll be the 50th president of the United States." Rashid also just so happened to be in charge of a project to put computers in UAE schools and Neil Bush was hawking the services of his Ignite! Inc., an e-learning educational software company.
Carlyle has its fingerprints on the Dubai Ports world deal to assume control of six major U.S. ports from Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O). After Treasury Secretary John Snow left CSX Corporation as its chairman, CSX Lines was sold to Carlyle, which renamed it Horizon Lines. David Sanborn, who was a CSX executive under Snow, became director of European and Latin American operations for Dubai Ports World and arranged to sell the Dubai state-owned firm CSX port operations in South America and Asia. Sanborn was then appointed Assistant Secretary of Transportation for Maritime Administration (MARAD), the oversight agency for U.S. shipping and ports. The Dubai Ports World deal to take over U.S. port operations was signed off by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), chaired by Sanborn's old CSX boss Snow. Perhaps not coincidental to the lucrative port deals, the Dubai Investment Corporation recently invested $100 million in The Carlyle Group. And Dubai Ports World's deal involves taking over operations at more than just six U.S. ports -- New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia/Camden, Baltimore, Miami, and New Orleans.
P&O's web site states the Dubai Ports World deal involves stevedore operations at 21 U.S. ports: Portland, ME; Boston, Davisville, RI; New York; Newark; Philadelphia; Camden, NJ; Wilmington, DE; Baltimore; Newport News, VA; Norfolk, VA; Portsmouth, VA; Miami; Lake Charles, LA, New Orleans; Beaumont, TX; Port Arthur, TX; Galveston, TX; Houston; Corpus Christi; and Freeport, TX.
The magazine In These Times reported yet another former CIA officer who had ties to the Gulf and who was heavily involved with the oil industry. He is Stephen “Satch” Baumgart of Reston, Virginia. He reportedly helped funnel arms to Sadaam Hussein in the 1980s with the approval of the CIA, which had, at the time, tilted to Baghdad in its war with Iran. Baumgart was linked to another Republican contributor and oil mogul, Pierre Falcone of Scottsdale, Arizona. Falcone was implicated in a complex guns-for-oil scandal involving Angola and Vice President Dick Cheney’s old company, Halliburton, a major player with the Luanda regime. Another player in that scandal was Russian-Israeli mobster Arkady Gaydamak, who is tied into an international network of smugglers connected to Marc Rich, Scooter Libby's one-time client. Falcone was also closely linked to Arizona Republican State Senator Scott Bundgaard, who ran for the House of Representatives’ Second District in Arizona.
There is also a connection between the scandal-plagued firm Custer Battles, which has been under investigation for fraud in Iraq security contracts, and Dubai. Custer Battles was formed in 2003 by Mike Battles, aged 33, a former U.S. Army and CIA officer and Scott Custer, also a former U.S. Army Ranger and employee of SAIC. Custer was Battles’s campaign assistant in a failed 2002 congressional race against Rhode Island Democratic Representative Patrick Kennedy. Custer Battles initial financing is sketchy but it is known that the company received $15 million in seed money from a Dubai venture capital firm. The venture capital firm hoped to raise an additional $100 million for Custer Battles ventures in Iraq. Battles refused to disclose the name of the Dubai firm.
A mercenary firm that supplies ex-South African counter-insurgency Koevoet commandos has links to Dubai. The firm, Erinys International, which established an Erinys Iraq branch, has its headquarters in London with offices in Johannesburg and Dubai.
Vice President Dick Cheney's old company, Halliburton, has some interesting partners in its work in occupied Iraq. On Dec. 11, WMR reported on links between Halliburton/Kellogg, Brown & Root and a Viktor Bout-owned airline based in Moldova, Aerocom/Air Mero. Bout's airlines have also reportedly been involved in flying low wage earners from East Asia to Dubai and on to Iraq where they work for paltry salaries in sub-standard living conditions. Halliburton/KBR has sub-contracted to a shadowy Dubai-based firm, Prime Projects International Trading LLC (PPI), which "trades" mainly in workers from Thailand, the Philippines, Nepal, India, Pakistan, and other poor Asian nations.
In 2004, after a Filipino PPI worker was killed in a mortar attack on Camp Anaconda in Iraq, the Philippines government of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo ordered PPI, which is based at P.O. Box 42252, Dubai, UAE, to send overseas Filipino workers OFWs) home from Iraq and Kuwait and banned it from further recruiting in the Philippines. Some of PPI's recruiting included running ads on the Internet. In addition to the other south Asian employees, the Philippine workers were employed by PPI under a Pentagon sweetheart umbrella contract let to KBR under the LOGCAP (Logistics Civil Augmentation Program) III program.
Although little is known about PPI, it reportedly has been linked to Halliburton/KBR for a number of years and has been associated with Halliburton contracts in the Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the Balkans during the time when Dick Cheney headed the firm. PPI has also been involved in operations at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where Filipino workers were involved in building the prison housing suspected "Al Qaeda" prisoners.
Inside sources report that PPI has some high level financial partners, including the al Nahayan royal family of the United Arab Emirates and Vice President Cheney.
Emirates Looked Other Way While Al Qaeda Funds Flowed
LA Times
20 January 2002
by Stephen Braun
URL: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-012002uae.story
Until Sept. 11, Osama bin Laden's terrorists in Afghanistan used the Persian Gulf crossroads of the United Arab Emirates as their lifeline to the outside world. Poor oversight in the loose federation of seven tiny sheikdoms allowed Bin Laden's Al Qaeda network and Taliban agents to set up clandestine arms-trading and money-laundering operations, according to accounts from American, United Nations, Afghan and U.A.E. sources.
In the emirate of Sharjah, Afghan-based militants linked up with Victor Bout, a Russian arms dealer accused of repeatedly violating United Nations weapon sanctions. And millions in Al Qaeda funds cascaded through the freewheeling financial institutions of the neighboring emirate of Dubai. Terrorists used a Somali warlord's money exchange, an Islamic bank once headed by the emirates' finance minister and currency houses that touted their ability to wire $1 million abroad overnight.
The U.S. investigation into the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon already has exposed trails leading back to the U.A.E. More than $120,000 was channeled through emirate bank accounts to suicide pilot Mohamed Atta and other suspected hijackers.
The suicide attacks finally prompted U.A.E. officials to crack down on Al Qaeda and its front ventures. But the sudden burst of urgency followed years of passivity.
The U.A.E. was one of only three countries that maintained diplomatic relations with the now-toppled Taliban regime. Despite quiet but persistent prodding by U.S. and other Western diplomats, the emirates' ruling elite was hesitant to reckon with the growing terrorist presence. Regulations that would target terrorists would also interfere with a laissez-faire economy that has bolstered the wealth of their entwined desert kingdoms.
Strategically located between the Arabian Peninsula and South Asia, the emirates' oil-rich confederation is barely 30 years old, a cash-stoked economic wonderland. The emirates are one of the world's busiest sea and air trade hubs, where both legal and illicit freight travels on ancient dhow sailing ships and aging Soviet-era cargo planes.
The emirates' rapid economic progress won admiration from American officials. But the U.S. also grew concerned as prominent entrepreneurs forged financial ties with Islamic militants.
The emirates "moved much too slowly and without adequate dedication to really putting controls into place," said Jonathan Winer, a former deputy assistant secretary of State for international law enforcement.
The U.S. pressed the emirates for tighter banking controls but moved delicately, not wanting to offend an ally in an already-complicated relationship. The emirates allow U.S. naval ships to berth in its harbors but also oppose America's pro-Israel tilt.
Officials with the U.A.E. government, Central Bank and airports in the emirates of Sharjah and Dubai all insisted that the emirates have been vigilant foes of terrorism. "The U.A.E. has been consistent in its cooperation," a Ministry of Information spokesman said. All of the U.A.E. officials declined to be identified by name.
U.S. authorities publicly compliment the emirates on a stepped-up campaign against terrorism since Sept. 11. "I think they get it and are truly being responsive," said R. Richard Newcomb, director of the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Asset Control. One Western diplomat based in the emirates said emirate officials "were horrified by what happened."
But current and former U.S. officials who urged the U.A.E. government to take action against Al Qaeda before Sept. 11 worry about the durability of the new commitment.
Even in the two months after the Sept. 11 attacks, "we certainly have evidence of money, fees and commissions being directed" to Al Qaeda from the now-closed exchange run by the Somali warlord, said Jimmy Gurule, Treasury's head of enforcement.
Under pressure from international finance ministries, the emirates finally agreed last year to bar their banks and currency exchanges from concealing funds illegally obtained or meant for criminal purposes, otherwise known as money laundering.
By then, though, Al Qaeda and Taliban operatives had burrowed deep inside the emirates. Bin Laden's terrorists found "deep-pocket contributions, government assistance, charities, banks, couriers and other ways of making money," said one U.S. official. The emirates' "assistance" took the form of "preventing information, preventing action," said one former National Security Council official.
At times, even the emirates' rulers betrayed sympathy for some of Bin Laden's aims.
One telling comment came during a 1999 meeting in the emirates between emirate and American officials on the sensitive topic of money laundering. The session was so important to the U.S. that the request had come from President Clinton himself, in a letter to the emirates' president, and in another from Defense Secretary William S. Cohen to his emirates counterpart.
The Americans were intent on blocking Al Qaeda's money in the wake of its coordinated attacks on two U.S. embassies in east Africa. But a senior sheik said it would be difficult to distinguish between Al Qaeda funds used for criminal activities such as the bombings and money meant for what he viewed as more acceptable training of Islamic rebels in Bosnia and Chechnya.
The visitors were stunned.
"That was a showstopper," said a U.S. official familiar with the conversation.
Planes Suspected in Arms Trafficking
The cargo planes that roar along Sharjah International Airport's lone runway are discards from the Soviet empire. Battered Antonovs and Ilyushins fly off every week on freight runs that span from Africa to Central Asia.
Aviation buffs from around the world bring their cameras to snap rare photos of these durable relics. But in the last five years, dozens of the planes have also drawn the focus of investigators and diplomats looking into their clandestine role in the flow of weapons to war-torn hot spots.
In 1999, the government of Swaziland notified the emirates government that more than two dozen Sharjah-based craft might not be airworthy and that the operators may have used the planes in arms trafficking. Two of the companies named were Air Cess and Flying Dolphin, both later identified by a U.N. report as involved in gun running to Africa.
By the time the alert went out, the two businesses had picked up an important client outside of Africa: the Taliban, which had placed their national airline at Al Qaeda's disposal.
The deal came together in Sharjah, at a hotel near the airport in October 1996, just a month after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan.
Two Russians spent hours in a third-floor room that day with young Mullah Farid Ahmed, plucked by the Taliban from his Islamic studies to serve as the emirates' representative for Afghanistan's Ariana Airways.
When the discussion ended, say Afghan and emirates air industry sources, Ahmed had agreed to depend on Air Cess for wheels, tires and other military equipment for Taliban air force planes. Flying Dolphin would provide charter flights when Ariana was unavailable.
Below the surface was another agenda, said an Afghan air expert familiar with the hotel meeting. Air Cess, the expert said, became a conduit for arms and ammunition obtained for the Taliban from several Eastern European countries.
Air Cess, Flying Dolphin and Ariana allegedly came together to support an air network that delivered poison chemicals, weapons, operatives and cash to Al Qaeda and the Taliban, according to accounts from U.N., Afghan and U.S. sources.
Flying Dolphin stepped in after U.S. and U.N. sanctions aimed at stopping terrorists froze Ariana's assets and took away the Afghan firm's international landing rights. For two months in late 2000 and early 2001, a Flying Dolphin Boeing 727 shuttled twice a week to the Taliban headquarters of Kandahar, Afghanistan.
Air Cess was owned by Bout, a former Soviet air force pilot who has been accused in U.N. reports of violating weapon embargoes in Angola, Sierra Leone and Liberia. Flying Dolphin is owned by Sheik Abdullah bin Zayed al Saqr al Nahyan, who was the emirates' ambassador to the U.S. from 1989 to 1992. A member of the ruling family of Abu Dhabi, the dominant emirate, Bin Zayed is described in a U.N. report as "a business associate of Victor Bout."
A U.S. State Department fact sheet issued in July alleges Bout heads a fleet of 60 cargo planes staffed by 300 pilots and employees and operates a shifting roster of companies used for running assault rifles, ammunition, missile launchers and helicopter gunships to the hot spots.
Repeated attempts to reach Bout through several of the emirate firms he has owned were unsuccessful. Bin Zayed acknowledged in a telephone interview that he knew Bout and Ahmed but insisted he did not work with them and never allowed his planes to be used for smuggling. "If there's anything happening like this," he said, "it's without my knowledge."
Ahmed has disappeared and could not be contacted.
A U.N. inquiry team has begun examining whether Bout was involved in violations of embargoes against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. American authorities are also investigating reports surfacing since Sept. 11 that Bout did business with Al Qaeda. In October, they were approached by a Bout operative who volunteered information about the smuggler's business ties to Al Qaeda.
Bout has never been arrested. A former Sharjah airport trade official familiar with Bout's career disagrees with the picture painted by the U.N. reports. "He's not the monster they say he is," said Richard Chichakli, who was manager of the airport's free-trade zone from 1993 to 1996.
From late 1996 on, Afghan and emirates sources said, the volume of Ariana and charter flights from Sharjah to Kandahar increased to as many as three to four flights a day. Officials of the newly installed Afghan government say many of the Ariana planes carried arms to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Shipments of chemical poison were also transported on several flights, said Dr. Ravan Farhadi, the Afghan permanent representative to the U.N. Citing Afghan and American intelligence reports, Farhadi said cyanide and other toxic substances purchased in Germany, the Czech Republic and Ukraine were "channeled through the United Arab Emirates" and flown out of Sharjah on Ariana cargo runs to Kandahar.
The Taliban, Farhadi said, "had nothing to do with this. These chemicals were for Bin Laden and his people. It was some of the chemicals they were using in experiments."
Bout moved his fleet in 1995 to Sharjah from Belgium, where law enforcement was shadowing him. That same year, the emirate opened its airport trade zone in a bid to rival Dubai, the nation's passenger hub. The zone nurtured a booming sea-to-air cargo industry that now moves more than 500,000 tons of freight a year.
The airport boasts on a Web site that its success stems from "the 'laissezfaire' attitude of the concerned governmental authorities such as Security, Immigration and Customs."
A U.A.E. spokesman said any arrangements among Air Cess, Flying Dolphin and Ariana were none of his government's business "as long as they are in accordance with [U.A.E.] laws and international standards." A Sharjah airport spokesman insisted that "there is no possibility that illegal goods are loaded or unloaded at Sharjah airport."
During his tenure, Chichakli said, Sharjah security restricted cargo loading to a monitored indoor facility, a move designed to prevent smuggling.
But Abdul Shukoor Arefee, a former Ariana technical crewman who flew regularly into Sharjah in 1996 and 1997, said Afghan planes would "park in isolated places" outside the loading zone, often at night. Watching crates hefted aboard in the dark, he said, he wondered "what they had in those boxes."
Ariana, Air Cess, Ahmed and Bout faced no pressure to curtail their operations until 1999, when the U.S. and U.N. began imposing sanctions on Al Qaeda and the Taliban. The emirates complied with the Ariana sanctions in 2000, but the Taliban's business contacts in Sharjah found ways to keep flying.
In late 2000, Flying Dolphin applied to the U.N. to take over Ariana's closed routes. Despite their own reports linking Flying Dolphin to arms smuggling, U.N. officials did not oppose the request.
Flying Dolphin's flights to Kandahar were usually half-filled with deported Afghan laborers and relief supplies, such as food and medicine, Bin Zayed said.
But on Jan. 19, 2001, the U.N. halted the shuttle. Its investigators suspect some of the Flying Dolphin flights may have also carried contraband.
"If that was so," Bin Zayed asked, "why did they give me permission? I went to them and said, 'Gentlemen, I want to fly.' I waited two months. Then they wrote me a letter and told me to stop. I really had no clue what was the reason."
By last year, U.N. teams were also trying to interview emirates officials about Bout's alleged weapon flights from Sharjah--first to African states and then to the Taliban. The teams were alternately rebuffed, delayed and aided grudgingly.
When a panel exploring Bout's role in violating an arms embargo in Angola visited the emirates in early 2000, Mohamed Al-Gaith, the emirates' director-general of civil aviation, told them he had no indication that Bout's firms had transported arms using planes based in Sharjah.
On a second visit in 2001, the U.N. team pressed for a close-up look at Bout's planes, employees and other firms suspected of arms trading. Emirates officials told the team they would have to "leave the country," then restricted them to a brief jeep tour of the Sharjah airport escorted by a U.A.E. intelligence official, said Johan Peleman, a Belgium arms trafficking expert who served on both panels and a subsequent one.
Returning six months ago, this time investigating the trail of weapons to Liberia, the U.N. panel was allowed to inspect Bout's planes and interview his brother, Serguei, who insisted Bout no longer runs Air Cess.
When a new panel pushed for a visit to Sharjah to check whether the Afghan embargo was working, emirates officials offered to meet, but not before the team's term had expired. An emirates government spokesman said "there has been no denial" of help, but Peleman concluded that "the Afghanistan sanctions issue is much more sensitive to the U.A.E. than any African conflict."
The emirates' cooperation likely will be tested again in the next few weeks. A new U.N. team is preparing to ask for a return visit to Sharjah--and for emirates officials' aid in their inquiry into Afghan sanctions violations and the involvement of Ariana, Air Cess and Flying Dolphin.
There are signs U.S. pressure may have paved their way.
At the urging of American officials, the emirates early last year halted the flights of almost all foreign-registered aircraft in Sharjah. Planes already registered in Russia were exempted--and some, Peleman said, may be among those used in the arms trade.
The emirates also began requiring Sharjah's cargo carriers to install expensive airborne collision avoidance systems on all of their planes. The goal, a former National Security Council official said, was to drive up Bout's costs and "drive him away."
Bout moved--but not far. According to Peleman, he has relocated operations to the neighboring emirates of Ajmaan and Ras al Khaima--but one U.A.E. cargo handler said some Air Cess planes are still on the ground in Sharjah.
Flying Dolphin has returned to its charter flights to the Far East and Europe, Bin Zayed said. And after three months of U.S. air attacks that decimated its fleet, Ariana has made a shaky return to service, though it uses a lone Antonov solely for domestic flights in western Afghanistan.
Some U.S. officials wonder if they might have done more early on to stem arms trade between Sharjah and Afghanistan. Their dilemma, a former NSC aide said, was that, as vexing as the weapon pipeline was, there was an even larger terrorism priority in the emirates: Al Qaeda's movement of vast amounts of illicit cash.
"The reason we didn't push harder [on Bout] is that we had to prioritize," the official said. "The money was a bigger one."
BCCI Scandal Was First Warning Sign
Dubai is the emirates' capital of cash. Businesspeople bring in suitcases stuffed with currency. Credit cards and checks are rarities, and there are ample reasons to keep stacks of bills on hand: The airport duty-free zone, with the world's cheapest prices on liquor, electronics and jewelry. A hotel in the shape of a billowing dhow sail, where two-story rooms, complete with butler, go for $15,000 a night. An underwater seafood restaurant reached by a two-minute ride on a submarine.
But the most important industry in Dubai is banking, in every form--from the age-old hawala, which moves money informally on an honor system, to the high-tech offshore branches of foreign banks. Al Qaeda used them all.
For years before the Sept. 11 attacks, the process of rooting out Al Qaeda's seams of money in the emirates was filled with frustration for the emirates and the U.S.
From the emirates' perspective, no rules were being broken. The government collects no income tax, so there seemed to be little reason to keep tabs on who was getting what, especially when the lack of money controls made the economy so strong. The U.S. saw in the emirates a nation passive in the face of an urgent problem. "They don't do anything on their own," said Winer, the State Department official.
The first hints of trouble in the emirates' go-go financial attitude came with the 1991 collapse of the Bank of Credit & Commerce International. BCCI was accused of using depositors' money to cover as much as $15 billion in mistakes, payoffs and bad debts. The ruling family of Abu Dhabi, the dominant emirate, owned 77% of the bank.
"BCCI did dirty work for every major terrorist service in the world," said Jack Blum, a Washington money-laundering expert who was a counsel to the U.S. Senate committee that investigated the case. But, he added, "there's a substantial amount that wasn't learned" from the experience.
The emirates focused in BCCI's aftermath on preventing bank fraud, not on the way banks get used by criminal organizations, Blum said.
The emirates were quick to comply when the U.S. asked in 1998 that some Taliban accounts be closed at Dubai Islamic Bank. The bank's chairman, Mohammed Khalfan bin Kharbash, is also the U.A.E. minister for financial and industrial affairs.
But the country did not pass laws that would help prevent or unearth other similar situations. The emirates "considered money laundering to be a drug problem," Winer said. "And as illegal drugs aren't much of a problem in the U.A.E., the U.A.E. always felt it didn't have a money-laundering problem, no matter what we said."
In January 2001, U.S. officials urged U.A.E. authorities to impose reporting requirements on hawalas.
By that time, the U.S. government had been investigating a hawala called Al Barakaat for nearly two years. Al Barakaat catered to Somalis abroad who wanted to send money home. Though the expatriates lived in the U.S. and Western Europe, the last stop before Somalia was always Al Barakaat's global headquarters in Dubai, where an estimated $25 million a year in handling and money-exchange fees were skimmed off for Bin Laden's group, U.S. officials say.
Ahmed Nur Ali Jim'ale, the network's founder, is a "member of the kitchen cabinet" of Bin Laden, said a Bush administration official. Jim'ale, a Somali warlord, started the business in 1989, the same year Bin Laden created Al Qaeda. Jim'ale later opposed the presence of American troops in his homeland, and Bin Laden took credit for helping to stir tribal resistance there.
It was not until Nov. 7 that the emirates moved against Al Barakaat. Emirates agents raided the hawala's office and bank, allowing American investigators to pore over seized records. The move was "a template for our ambitions" to work together, a U.S. official said.
Yet Jim'ale, still in the emirates, has not been questioned, a Central Bank spokesman said, because judicial authorities "are awaiting evidence" from other countries. Jim'ale is contesting the freezing of the hawala's assets. The bank spokesman says of terrorist financing through Al Barakaat: "We believe it did not exist."
In the years preceding the terrorist attacks, American frustration had been mounting. It seemed as if "we spend countless hours cajoling, begging, urging for money-laundering laws, and it never happens," said a former NSC official.
So the U.S. sought outside help in 2000, from an international group of treasury departments known as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). "What we did was we got 29 other countries to join us in threatening sanctions," said William Wechsler, who tracked terrorist finances for the National Security Council.
In a confidential report to its members in February 2000, the task force conspicuously mentioned that in the emirates "there is essentially no anti-money-laundering" activity. The slight irritated U.A.E. rulers. They summoned the U.S. ambassador to complain.
The emirates were now on notice that the task force would be deciding whether to limit the country's access to Western banks. But the terrorists were moving faster than the task force.
In June 2000, Marwan Al-Shehhi received $4,790, wired to Manhattan from the emirates. Al-Shehhi would later help hijack United Airlines Flight 175, which flew into the south tower of the World Trade Center.
The next month, federal court records show, $9,485 was wired from the emirates into a Florida SunTrust bank account in the names of Al-Shehhi and Mohamed Atta, the leader of the hijacking operation.
While those transactions stayed under a $10,000 limit designed to trigger a "suspicious activity report" from banks to the federal government, others did not. On Aug. 30, 2000, $19,985 was wired from the emirates to the SunTrust account of Al-Shehhi and Atta. On Sept. 18, 2000, $69,985 was wired from the emirates to that account.
If the emirates had already put money-laundering laws in place, the sender in the emirates likely would have had to provide identification and an address--information that might have scared off the supplier or sped up any investigation of the transaction.
On Nov. 14, 2000, the emirates issued a regulation to all banks, money-changers, finance companies and other monetary institutions operating in the country. Managers and employees were "obliged personally to report a transaction aimed at money laundering to" a government unit in Abu Dhabi.
American officials were unimpressed. "The enforcement part is nil," Winer said.
By June, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi used a cash deposit to open an account at a Dubai branch of the London-based Standard Chartered Bank. He would later be tagged "the paymaster" of the Sept. 11 operation. The same day, Fayez Rashid Ahmed Hassan Al Qadi Banihammad used a cash deposit to open savings and checking accounts at the same branch, federal court documents show. He would join Al-Shehhi aboard United Flight 175.
In the summer, as the FATF began considering sanctions against the emirates, the emirates asked the U.S. for help in getting more time to enact a money-laundering law. They also made an offer: If the U.S. provided information about Bout's bank accounts, they would crack down on his assets to prove the emirates could be effective.
On Sept. 8, the top banking authorities of Oman and the emirates held a news conference to announce that they would enact laws to combat money laundering by the end of the year.
The hijackers were already returning their unused funds. On the day of the news conference, Mohamed Atta wired at least $7,860 back to Mustafa Ahmed in the emirates. The next day, hijacker Waleed M. Alshehri wired $5,000 to "Ahamad Mustafa" in the emirates. The day after that, Al-Shehhi wired $5,400 to "Mustafa Ahmad" in the emirates.
On Sept. 11, about $16,300 was deposited into Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi's Dubai bank account. He moved $6,534 from Fayez Ahmed's account using a check signed and dated Sept. 10. He withdrew most of the remaining money with an ATM card.
Al Qaeda's money was on the move again.
In the last few years as Dubai has become quite expensive. many companies have moved their bases to Sharjah, the neighboring emirate just 30 kilometers away, where rents are half those of Dubai. Indeed many of the aircraft used at Terminal Two are owned by anonymous and shadowy companies in Sharjah. Some of these aircraft owners like Air Bas have been linked to notorious arms smugglers including Victor Bout. Instead of dealing directly with the U.S. government, these companies rent their planes to middle agencies like Chapman Freeborn and Coyne Air, which in turn provide them to Skylink and EGL.
BCCI liquidators sue sheikh for £289m
0.The Guardian, Wednesday August 11 1999
Liquidators winding down the scandal-hit Bank of Credit and Commerce International are personally suing a Middle Eastern ruler for £289.4m they claim he owes the stricken bank. The debt, which dates originally from 1975, will be pursued in the high court in London.
BCCI, until its collapse in July 1991, was majority owned by the sheikh and government of Abu Dhabi, one of the United Arab Emirates. This action is against the sheikh of a fellow UAE state, Sharjah.
It is one of the largest single actions during the eight years of litigation that have followed the closure of BCCI. It is also highly unusual, in that the emirate and government of Sharjah and the sheikh are alleged both to be liable for the debt.
But the sheikh's advisers may well point out that the ruler personally guaranteed only earlier versions of the loan, which have been superseded during various reschedulings of the 24-year-old debt.
Sheikh Sultan Bin Mohamed Al-Qasimi - an alumnus of Exeter university - was hit by tragedy in April, when his 24-year-old son, also Mohamed, was found dead at the family's Wych Cross Place home near East Grinstead in Sussex. Heroin and alcohol were found in his system, and the East Sussex coroner ruled his death to have been caused by the non-dependent abuse of drugs.
In the wake of BCCI's collapse, the bank was found to be riddled with fraud; "black holes" in the bank's accounts, totalling $13bn, made it the greatest financial scandal in history. Although the sheikh of Abu Dhabi's involvement with BCCI has effectively ended, the prospect of the writ may cause embarrassment in the UAE.
Sharjah is one of the smaller emirates in a federation dominated by Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Despite oil and gas reserves, its wealth is relatively modest and attempts to make it a thriving dormitory zone for Dubai stalled when the sheikh prohibited alcohol. It is thought Sharjah may have difficulty paying the claim should it lose in court.
The debt dates back to December 1975, four years after Britain pulled out of the UAE, formerly the Trucial States.
Sharjah, a former British army base, needed an electricity plant and BCCI lent its power department up to 163m dirhams (about £28m). In June 1982, this was converted into a 250m dirham loan (about £43m), allegedly guaranteed by the sheikh.
According to BCCI's liquidators, the amount grew, through various reschedulings and failures by Sharjah's government or the sheikh to pay, to reach a total of 1.7bn dirhams, about £289m.
The UAE embassy in London would not comment yesterday. It seems, however, the sheikh's guarantee may have been explicit only in earlier versions of the loan.
5 comments:
Terry Lindon the serial fraudster is once more working with Dubai Funds to market to the UK. He is a Disqualified Director and recipient of a criminal record, and peoples greed still ensure he makes money at the expense of others
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