Exclusive: Blueprints describe a ‘case study’ community where residents submit biometric data to gain entry

The United Arab Emirates plans to fund “Gaza’s first planned community” on the ruined outskirts of Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city. Palestinian residents there will have access to basic services like education, healthcare and running water, as long as they submit to biometric data collection and security vetting, according to planning documents and people familiar with the latest round of talks at the US-led Civil Military Coordination Center in Israel.

The planned city would mark the UAE’s first investment in a postwar reconstruction project located in the part of Gaza currently held by Israel. The wealthy Gulf state has contributed more than $1.8bn of humanitarian assistance to Gaza since 7 October 2023, according to UAE state media, making it Gaza’s largest humanitarian donor.

High court ruling marks first time a foreign state has been held liable for domestic servitude by its envoy on UK soil

The United Arab Emirates must pay more than £260,000 to a victim of human trafficking who was exploited by one of its diplomats in London, the high court has ruled.

Lawyers representing the woman said it was unprecedented for a court to order a foreign state to pay for domestic servitude by a diplomat on UK soil.

Riyadh says Aidarous al-Zubaidi, leader of the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council, was helped to flee Yemen

Saudi Arabia has accused the United Arab Emirates of smuggling a UAE-backed separatist leader out of Yemen after he failed to turn up for crisis talks in Riyadh on Wednesday.

The Saudi-led coalition in Yemen said Aidarous al-Zubaidi had fled the port city of Aden for Abu Dhabi under Emirati supervision, deepening a diplomatic row between Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Saudi airstrikes hit Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s military camps after he defies a demand to travel to Riyadh for talks

The leader of Yemen’s routed southern separatist movement, Aidarous al-Zubaidi, has decided to make a defiant last stand in Aden, his supporters say, rejecting a Saudi ultimatum to travel to Riyadh for talks and – for now – a plan to flee the southern capital.

Al-Zubaidi, the president of the Southern Transitional Council (STC), has been gathering his remaining troops in Aden as rival Saudi-backed forces seek to take control of Aden. His supporters say his mood is to fight it out although he knows it is likely there will be an attempt to kill him.

Exclusive: data reveals hundreds of UK nests have been raided in the past decade amid growing appetite to own prized birds for racing and breeding

In the echoing exhibition halls of Abu Dhabi’s International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition, hundreds of falcons sit on perches under bright lights. Decorated hoods fit snugly over their heads, blocking their vision to keep them calm.

In a small glass room marked Elite Falcons Hall, four young birds belonging to an undisclosed Emirati sheikh are displayed like expensive jewels. Entry to the room, with its polished glass, controlled lighting and plush seating, is restricted to authorised visitors only.

Attack signals escalation in tensions between the kingdom and UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council

Saudi Arabia has bombed Yemen’s port city of Mukalla, targeting what it said was a weapons shipment from the United Arab Emirates meant for the Southern Transitional Council (STC), a Yemeni separatist force.

The UAE said it was “surprised” by the Saudi strike, and that the shipment did not contain any weapons and was meant for UAE forces, rather than any Yemeni groups. It called for de-escalation and said the developments in Yemen should be handled “with responsibility”.

Alleged strikes close to UAE-backed forces follow Riyadh’s call for STC to withdraw from newly seized provinces

A separatist group in southern Yemen that this month seized two oil-rich provinces has claimed that Saudi Arabia has fired warning airstrikes directed at its forces.

Videos issued on Friday by media linked to the United Arab Emirates-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) showed airstrikes that it said were close to its positions in Wadi Nahab, Hadramaut province.

Exclusive Guardian investigation finds companies set up by people sanctioned by US hired Colombian fighters for Rapid Support Forces, widely suspected of war crimes in Sudan

Close to Tottenham Hotspur’s shiny football stadium in London is a squat, nondescript block of flats. It holds a grim secret beyond the unremarkable beige brickwork – a cramped, second-floor apartment in the British capital, linked to murderous atrocities unfolding 3,000 miles south.

The one-bedroom flat off north London’s Creighton Road is, according to UK government records, tied to a transnational network of companies involved in the mass recruitment of mercenaries to fight in Sudan alongside paramilitaries accused of myriad war crimes and genocide.

Southern Transitional Council, backed by UAE, told it could face airstrikes after its recent huge territorial gains

As many as 20,000 Saudi-backed forces are gathering on the border of Yemen as the separatist Southern Transitional Council comes under pressure to withdraw from the huge territorial gains it has made in the last month in the vast, oil-rich governorate on Hadramaut in eastern Yemen.

The STC is using its advance to raise its demand for Yemen to revert to two states, north and south, as it had been until 1990.

Family friend, sources in Russia and Syria, and leaked data help give rare insight into life of dictator’s reclusive household

In 2011, a group of teenage boys spray-painted a warning on to a wall in their school playground: “It’s your turn, Doctor.” The graffiti was a thinly veiled threat that Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, a London-trained ophthalmologist, would be next in the line of Arab dictators toppled by the then raging Arab spring.

It took 14 years, during which 620,000 were killed and nearly 14 million displaced, but eventually the doctor’s turn came and Assad was deposed, fleeing to Moscow in the middle of the night.

Senior commanders accused of atrocities against civilians face asset freezes – but no action against key backer UAE

The UK has placed sanctions on four senior commanders of Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces suspected of involvement in “heinous” violence against civilians in the city of El Fasher, but decided not to take any action against their key military and diplomatic backer, the United Arab Emirates, or their chief commander.

British officials suggested they preferred to use their leverage with the UAE and the RSF commander, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, privately, but admitted there was little sign of a ceasefire in Sudan’s near three-year civil war.

The president’s son-in-law is once again at the center of an international business deal that will require administration approval

On Monday, Paramount Skydance launched a $108bn takeover bid for Warner Bros Discovery, the entertainment giant that owns Hollywood movie studios, along with CNN, HBO and other media businesses. The bid is led by David Ellison, son of the tech billionaire Larry Ellison – a prominent Donald Trump supporter and Republican donor. Netflix had already prevailed over Paramount in a previous bidding competition for the purchase, but Trump announced on Sunday that he would “be involved” in his administration’s review of the Netflix deal. The president suggested the sale “could be a problem” because Netflix is already dominant in the US streaming market.

Paramount left out a significant fact in the press release announcing its offer: the bid includes funding from the private equity firm owned by Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, as well as three Arab monarchies, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, which collectively have billions of dollars in ongoing ventures involving the Trump family business. Those details were buried in required paperwork filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

From Vietnam to the Balkans, Donald Trump’s family has launched a global dealmaking blitz since his re-election

A crusading prosecutor in the Balkans comes under pressure to drop a big case. Vietnamese villagers learn they are to be evicted. A convicted crypto kingpin in the Gulf receives a pardon.

All have one thing in common: they appear to be connected to the Trump family’s campaign to amass riches around the world. Since Donald Trump’s re-election a year ago, warnings that his use of presidential power to advance personal interests is corroding American democracy have grown ever louder. What is less understood – and perhaps even more dangerous – is the damage this is doing everywhere else.

Ukrainian official cites ‘common understanding’, but no sign territorial concessions or security guarantees are agreed

The White House trumpeted “tremendous progress” in peace negotiations with Russia and Ukraine on Tuesday, but as discussions between US, Russian and Ukrainian officials continued in Abu Dhabi there was little sign of progress on core sticking points that have prevented a deal taking shape so far.

The White House spokesperson, Karoline Leavitt, put an optimistic spin on the talks. Writing on X, however, she conceded there were “a few delicate, but not insurmountable, details” that needed to be ironed out and which would require further talks. Donald Trump said he believed a deal was close. He told a White House event: “We’re going to get there.”

Pageantry and trillion-dollar promises reveal how Washington’s loyalties may be tilting toward the Gulf

The White House welcome bestowed on the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was the most lavish of the Trump presidency, and a gaudily clear statement of its foreign policy priorities.

It was billed as a mere working visit, but it was more extravagant than any previous state visit. The president greeted the prince on the south lawn, the White House’s biggest stage. There were uniformed men on horses bearing flags and a flypast of fighter jets.

Ryan Cornelius was arrested in 2008 over a bank loan and will be 84 years old when he is due to be released

A Dubai bank is instrumental in the long-running detention of the 71-year-old British businessman Ryan Cornelius, who is serving a 30-year sentence that will keep him in jail until he is 84, his brother-in-law claims.

Recent accounts show the Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB), which claims to be the trailblazer in championing Islamic values in banking, is on course to make more than $2bn in profit this year.