UAE leadership is trying to demonstrate a clear divide between the UAE and Iran ahead of not just further UN sanctions but also the more imminent likelihood of stronger US unilateral measures. With the international mood toughening toward Iran, the UAE may be signaling that it too has now set its face firmly against Iranian pressure. Given the widespread perception that the UAE, particularly through Dubai, remains Iran’s primary conduit for trading with the world, Sheikh Abdullah’s words may intend both to underline the UAE’s separation from Iran and to dampen international attention to the trade linkages. [Finally] the UAE seems..to have lost patience and is testing the international resolve to support the UAE in settling this islands dispute.

Indian press has been sharply critical of the conduct of the trial. The criticism targets the police who orchestrated and filmed a re-enactment of the killing, starring the accused, and then showed the film in court. Moreover, widespread reports suggest that in their investigations the Sharjah Police used techniques, such as sleep deprivation and stress positioning, that are tantamount to torture. All this is happening in a charged atmosphere of potential friction....

Already pressure is growing for the emirate to sever larger parts of its historic trading links than it has so far in complying with sanctions. This would damage a vital economic lifeline – and just as Dubai may be getting back on track from the economic difficulties of its past 18 months. Moreover, it is a barely disguised secret that many in the West, most notably the US, rely on Dubai’s close links with Iran: for gathering information and intelligence, logging the movement of money to and from Iran, and maintaining back-channels of communication to Tehran that would not be possible otherwise.

The world’s financial media purred with pleasure at the better than expected terms on offer and international markets had the whole of the following day to participate in an upwards surge in response to the news. How different this was from the froth and near panic that greeted the announcement exactly four months earlier that Dubai World would be seeking a debt payment standstill, with many luridly describing this as tantamount to a wholesale, national default.