UAE President Al Nahyan to meet Putin in St. Petersburg

On Friday, June 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold talks with his counterpart from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. This was told to journalists by the assistant to the President of Russia Yuri Ushakov.

According to him, the leaders of the states will consider the issues of work SPIEF and development of relations between Russia and the UAE, as well as discuss a number of international and regional issues. As Ushakov himself put it, Putin’s meetings with Al Nahyan take place quite often (he came to Russia for the 12th time), and the presidents have developed “trusting and constructive relations.”

Special attention was paid to the OEA at SPIEF-2023. According to Ushakov, this year the emirates have “the honorary status of a guest country.” A high-ranking Arab delegation arrived at SPIEF, which includes the Emir of Ras al-Khaimah and a member of the Supreme Union Council of the UAE, Sheikh Saud bin Saqr al-Qasim.

In addition to him, the delegation includes a number of UAE ministers and entrepreneurs. More than 140 events are announced in the SPIEF program, in which more than 1,000 moderators and speakers will take part.

Al Nahyan will thus be another foreign leader to meet with Putin in St. Petersburg during the SPIEF. Prior to this, it was reported that Algerian President Abdelmajid Tebbun, Cuban Prime Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz, Kyrgyz Prime Minister Akylbek Japarov, as well as Armenian and South Ossetian Presidents Vahagn Khachatryan and South Ossetian Alan Gagloev will take part in the forum.

In total, Al Nahyan visited Russia 11 times in various capacities, and in 2019 he received the Russian president.

During the previous meeting in October 2022, the Sheikh informed the Russian leader that the UAE is ready to take on the role of mediator between Moscow and Kiev. In turn, Putin told his interlocutor about the situation at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant in Ukraine and about Moscow’s efforts to ensure nuclear safety. In addition, the parties touched upon the issues of trade and economic cooperation between the two countries.

According to the Minister of Economic Development Maxim Reshetnikov, for the period from 2019 to 2022. The trade turnover between Russia and the UAE grew fivefold and reached a record $9 billion last year. During this period, Russia, according to the Minister of Industry and Trade Denis Manturov, exported products worth $8.5 billion to the Arab monarchy, an increase of 71%. At the same time, the volume of tourist traffic in the UAE exceeded the pre-pandemic figures of 1.2 million trips.

The next visit of the sheikh confirms that Russia and the UAE have developed a relationship of trust, says RIAC expert Kirill Semenov. This was already demonstrated during his first visit to St. Petersburg in October 2022, as Al Nahyan became one of the few foreign heads of state who decided to come here after the start of the NWO, adds Semenov: “Now the UAE can be included in the list of leading countries world, as they are the largest financial and economic center not only in the Middle East.”

In addition, Nikolai Surkov, a researcher at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at IMEMO RAS, continues that Abu Dhabi is Moscow’s largest trading partner in the Gulf. “Our country is the source of a large number of tourists in the UAE. Russians traditionally make big investments in real estate there. Russia is also of interest to the emirates as an important element for ensuring the country’s food security,” the expert said.

Nurlan Gasimov and Vladimir Kulagin participated in the preparation of the material