Emirati writer to critics: ‘UAE not like any other Arab state’

The UAE is different from other Arab countries, an Emirati writer and commentator defended his country in light of the European Union’s latest resolution criticizing the Gulf state’s human rights standards.

In an op-ed published in The Independent Wednesday, Mishaal Gergawi, said Arab states shouldn’t be perceived as identical nor member states of the Gulf Co-operation Council were the same.

“It [UAE] is unique in the Arab world in the sense that it was never meant to be, and its subsequent survival and flourishing has been nothing short of a miracle,” Gergawi wrote.

UAE’s unique example stemmed from its history which had “virtually no terrorism or mass dissent” and its ability to “enjoy fruits of peace and relative progression,” he continued.

He listed examples of cases used by the EU to highlight UAE’s human rights violations and described it as “reductionism” without delving into “evidence, nuance and history that it effectively paints a false image.”

For Gergawi, the critics fail to see the UAE’s 18-year effort to “peacefully reintegrate” Islamists into society and state and despite the Islamists allegiance to a “leader of a foreign movement.”

In October, UAE’s ambassador in the UK, also wrote an op-ed in another British newspaper The Guardian, to defend the country.

Abdul Rahman Al-Mutaiwee hailed the country’s achievement and said the progress was due to the sound governances of the UAE’s leadership. Like Gergawi, he also justified the arrests of Islamists especially of Al-Islah, the UAE’s branch of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Later October, the UAE criticized the EU resolution concerning human rights in the UAE as “biased.”