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The Scottish Government is under fire for stepping up a charm offensive to the United Arab Emirates despite evidence it has armed a militia accused of genocide and widespread sexual violence in Sudan.
Deputy first minister Kate Forbes is due to travel to Dubai and Abu Dhabi later this month for meetings with the Emirati government and businesses. It will be her second visit to the UAE in nine months.
The trip is part of an ongoing effort to strengthen economic ties with the oil-rich state and secure investment in Scottish companies and universities. Forbes has said the countries share “common visions” and that recent meetings and visits reflect a “mutual interest in deepening the partnership”.
But human rights groups have condemned the strategy. One told The Ferret it was “disgusting” and “utterly immoral” in light of the UAE’s alleged role in Sudan’s brutal civil war, while Amnesty argued ministers needed to speak up about human rights abuses even when it is “politically or economically inconvenient”.
In response, the Scottish Government said it had provided over £1m to support humanitarian efforts in Sudan and described the UAE as a “key trade and investment partner” for both Scotland and the UK.
The war in Sudan – fought between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – has killed more than 150,000 people and displaced around 12 million since it erupted in April 2023. The UN has described it as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.
In January 2025, the previous US administration concluded that the paramilitary force and allied militias had committed genocide and sanctioned its leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo. Reasons given included the “mass rape of civilians” by soldiers under his control.
The UAE has strenuously denied providing weapons to the RSF and publicly called for a ceasefire. However the country is widelyviewed by analysts and experts as the militia’s main backer and UN experts have said they consider claims that it has provided military support to the RSF to be “credible”.
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Forbes visit between 27 and 29 January for the second ‘UAE Scotland Week’ – an initiative developed jointly by the Scottish Government, business agency Scottish Enterprise and the UAE’s ministry of economy – will be the latest step in a Scottish Government drive to deepen ties with the Gulf state.
The first ‘Scotland week’ took place last April, with Forbes speaking at a reception hosted by the Abu Dhabi chamber of commerce.
While in the Emirates last year, the deputy first minister also met the UAE’s ministers for investment and foreign trade, as well as senior representatives of Mubadala, one of the country’s sovereign wealth funds.
Her trip was credited with bringing the UAE-led ‘Investopia Global’ investment summit to Edinburgh in December 2025 – at which Forbes and Scottish Enterprise chief executive, Adrian Gillespie, were both speakers.
Taxpayer funded Scottish Enterprise announced the opening of its own ‘hub’ in Abu Dhabi in April to help Scotland’s clean energy firms sell into the Emirati market.
Just days before the Investopia event, the Scottish Government touted a “historic agreement” between the space industries in Scotland and the UAE which would “deepen co-operation” across areas including satellite manufacturing and research.
A letter of intent signed between the industry body for the sector, Space Scotland, and the UAE government-owned Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre created “major new opportunities for collaboration”, business minister Richard Lochhead claimed.
Though both sides in Sudan’s civil war have been accused of atrocities, the RSF is seen to have engaged in particularly extreme brutality, often targeting non-Arab communities.
Violence following its capture of El Fasher, the army’s last remaining stronghold in the western region of Darfur, drew global attention late last year.
After an 18-month siege, RSF fighters overran El Fasher at the end of October. The UN said the RSF carried out “mass killings, rape, attacks against humanitarian workers and looting” after capturing the city.
Satellite imagery showed streets turned red with blood and strewn with bodies. According to Yale University analysis of these images, the “widespread and systematic” mass killings targeted civilians trying to flee the city and were followed by a “multi-week campaign” to destroy evidence by burning, burying and removing bodies.
The UAE has repeatedly been accused of being the RSF’s chief supporter and some analysts argue it could not have fought on so long without Emirati backing, which it is believed to be providing partly due to concerns about Islamist elements in the Sudanese army.
The UN has described accusations that the UAE has provided arms to the militia via neighbouring Chad as “credible”.
A leaked report by a UN panel of experts detected multiple flights from the UAE in which transport planes apparently tried to avoid detection as they flew into areas of Chad where weapons have been smuggled across the border.
In May last year, an Amnesty International investigation concluded advanced Chinese weaponry used by the RSF had “almost certainly” been re-exported by the UAE in breach of an arms embargo. There have been reports that UK-made military equipment has ended up in RSF hands – prompting calls for an end to arms sales to the Gulf state.
The Emirates have also been accused by US intelligence services of supplying the RSF with sophisticated Chinese-made drones.
The claim that the UAE has provided the RSF with advanced weaponry such as drones has sparked concern around Scotland’s new relationship with its space sector.
Peter Burt of Space Watch – which campaigns against the militarisation of space – raised fears about the partnership and pointed out that the UAE’s space programme was “specifically linked to military goals”.
“Virtually all space technology is dual use, meaning that it can be used for harmful military purposes as well as beneficial civil purposes,” Burt continued.
“The risks of harm are increased when space services are provided to nations which have a track record of supporting military aggression.”
He added: “The Scottish Government would never enter into a space partnership with a nation like Russia because of its aggression towards Ukraine, so why is it looking to co-operate with the UAE, which is wreaking havoc across North Africa and the Middle East?”
Emily Apple, media coordinator of the Campaign Against the Arms Trade, said it was “utterly immoral” and “disgusting” that the Scottish Government was “courting” the UAE.
“There should be an immediate embargo on all arms exports to the UAE, not increased cooperation and investment, especially in areas such as space and satellite technology that has the potential for military exploitation," Apple told The Ferret.
“States need to know there are consequences for their complicity in war crimes, and this has to be applied consistently, whether that’s Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the UAE arming the RSF or any other state that’s committing or enabling atrocities."
Liz Thomson, Amnesty’s programme director in Scotland called on ministers to explain how doing business with the UAE “is consistent with the commitment to act as a good global citizen”.
She said: “If the Scottish government isn't prepared to speak up about human rights abuses even when it’s economically or politically inconvenient to do so then it simply cannot claim to be a principled global actor.”
The Scottish Government pointed out that it had provided £1.25m to communities in Sudan and neighbouring countries since the civil war broke out. This included £250,000 in September 2025 to help people affected by famine, displacement and gender-based violence.
A spokesperson continued: “The UAE is a key trade and investment partner for Scotland and the UK, with growing bilateral engagement that has positioned Scotland across priority sectors.”
A Scottish Enterprise spokeswoman said: "Our remit as the national economic development agency for Scotland includes identifying and developing opportunities for Scottish businesses overseas, particularly in those priority markets identified by the Scottish Government in the Trading Nation strategy.
“The UAE is one of these priority markets."
A SpaceScotland spokesperson said its letter of intent with the UAE space agency was “non-binding” and explored “opportunities for member companies to work with multiple Gulf nations around environmental monitoring, educational outreach, using satellite data for agriculture and regional water challenges and space sustainability”.
“Space Scotland is a non-profit company supporting commercial space organisations,” they noted.
The UAE government and the RSF were asked to comment.
Paul is an investigative journalist with a focus on the environment, energy and climate change. His work has been featured by Channel 4 News and the UK’s leading newspapers. When not Ferreting he can be found walking and listening to podcasts.
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