As UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer arrived in Doha as part of a Gulf tour spanning Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar, he discussed efforts to secure the US-Iran ceasefire and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Starmer warned there’s more ‘work to do’, stressing the need for regional partners to restore global energy flows.
Published On 10 Apr 202610 Apr 2026
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The Strait of Hormuz, which links the Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, has held global attention since Israel and the US began their war on Iran in February.
Until fighting began, the narrow channel, through which 20 per cent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies are shipped from Gulf producers in peacetime, remained toll-free and safe for vessels. The strait is shared by Iran and Oman and does not fall into the category of international waters.
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After the US and Israel began strikes, Iran retaliated by attacking “enemy” merchant ships in the strait, effectively halting passage for all, stranding shipping, and creating one of the worst-ever global energy distribution crises.
Tehran continued to refuse to re-open the strait to all traffic at the start of this week, despite US President Donald Trump’s threats to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges if it did not relent. Trump backed away from his threat on Tuesday night when a two-week ceasefire, brokered by Pakistan, was declared.
That followed a 10-point peace proposal from Iran that Trump described as a “workable” basis on which to negotiate a permanent end to hostilities.
As part of the truce, Tehran has now issued official terms it says will guide its control of the Strait going forward. The US has not directly acknowledged the terms ahead of talks set to begin in Islamabad on Friday. However, analysts say Tehran’s continued control will be unpopular with Washington, as well as other countries.
During the crisis, only a few ships from specific countries deemed friendly to Iran and those which pay a toll have been granted safe passage. At least two tolls for ships are believed to have been paid in Chinese yuan, in what appears to be a strategy to weaken the US dollar, but also to avoid US sanctions. China, which buys 80 percent of Iran’s oil, already pays Tehran in yuan.
Here’s what we know about how shipments will work from now on:
On Tuesday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi said Iran would grant safe passage through the strait during the ceasefire in “coordination with Iran’s Armed Forces and with due consideration of technical limitations”.
On Wednesday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) released a map of the strait showing a safe route for ships to follow. The map appears to direct ships further north towards the Iranian coast and away from the traditional route closer to the coast of Oman.
In a statement, the IRGC said all vessels must use the new map for navigation due to “the likelihood of the presence of various types of anti-ship mines in the main traffic zone”.
It is unclear whether Iran is collecting toll fees during the ceasefire period.
However, Trump said on Tuesday the US would be “helping with the traffic buildup” in the strait and that the US army would be “hanging around” as the negotiations go on.
The Strait will be “OPEN & SAFE” he posted on his Truth Social media site on Thursday, adding that US troops would not leave the area, and threatening to resume attacks if the talks don’t go well.
It’s not known to what extent US troops are directing what happens in the strait now.
Delhi-based maritime analyst C Uday Bhaskar told Al Jazeera that there is a lot of “uncertainty” about who can sail through the strait, and that only between three and five ships have transited since the war was paused.
Among Tehran’s main demands listed on its 10-point plan are that the US and Israel permanently cease all attacks on Iran and its allies – particularly Lebanon – lift all sanctions, and allow Iran to retain control over Hormuz. The plan has not been fully published but is understood to be a starting point for talks.
Iranian media say Iran is considering a plan to charge up to $2m per vessel to be shared with Oman on the opposite side of the strait. Other reports suggest Iran could charge $1 per barrel of oil being shipped.
Revenues raised would be used to rebuild military and civilian infrastructure damaged by US-Israeli strikes, Tehran said.
Oman has rejected the idea. Transport minister Said Al-Maawali said on Wednesday that the Omanis previously “signed all international maritime transport agreements” which bar taking fees.
Critics of Iran’s plan to charge tolls say it violates international law guiding safe maritime passage, and should not be part of a final ceasefire agreement.
The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) says levies cannot be charged on ships sailing through international straits or territorial seas.
The law allows coastal states to collect fees for services rendered, such as navigation assistance or port use, but not for passage itself.
Neither the US nor Iran has ratified that particular convention, however.
Even if they had, there could be ways to get around this law anyway. Analyst Bhaskar told Al Jazeera that if Iran instead charged fees to de-mine the strait and make it safe for passage again, that could be allowable under maritime laws.
There is no precedent in recent history of countries officially taxing passage through international straits or waterways.
In October 2024, a United Nations Security Council report alleged that the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen were collecting “illegal fees” from shipping companies to allow vessels to pass through the Red Sea and the Bab-el-Mandeb strait, where it was targeting ships linked to Israel during the Gaza war.
Last week, a top adviser to Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei suggested the Houthis could shut the Bab al-Mandeb shipping route again in light of the war on Iran.
Tolls for passage through the Strait of Hormuz would likely most affect oil and gas-producing countries in the Gulf, but ripple effects will spread to others as well, as the current supply shocks have shown.
Gulf countries, which issued statements calling for the reopening of the passage and praising the ceasefire on Wednesday, would also face a continuing degree of uncertainty, analysts say, as Iran could again disrupt flows in the future.
Before the ceasefire was announced, Bahrain had already proposed a resolution at the UN Security Council calling on member states to coordinate and jointly reopen the passage by “all necessary means”. It was backed by Qatar, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Jordan. On April 7, 11 of 15 UNSC members voted in favour of that resolution.
But Russia and China vetoed the resolution, saying it was biased against Iran and did not address the initial strikes on Iran by the US and Israel.
Beyond the region, observers say the US is unlikely to accept indefinite toll demands by Iran as part of the negotiations expected to begin on Friday.
A toll to pass through the Strait of Hormuz “is not going to go down well with President Trump and his expectations that the strait should be open for everyone”, Amin Saikal, a professor at the Australian National University, said.
Other major powers have also voiced opposition. Ahead of the ceasefire, Britain had begun discussions with 40 other countries to find a way to reopen the strait.
Practical realities in the strait might see a different scenario play out with ship owners losing millions each day their vessels remain stranded seeking to get them out quickly and undamaged experts say. They are more likely to comply with Iran, at least for now.
“If I were the owner of a VLCC [very large crude carrier] which weighs about 300,000 tonnes, whose value could be a quarter billion dollars…I would believe the Iranians if they said we have laid mines,” Bhaskar said.
Former Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has proposed a roadmap for ending the United States-Israeli war on Iran as tensions escalate across the Middle East.
Zarif’s plan was published by Foreign Affairs magazine on Friday and goes “beyond a temporary ceasefire”.
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The war, which erupted on February 28 with US-Israeli strikes on Iran, has spread across the Middle East and convulsed the global economy as Tehran attacked its neighbours, claiming to be targeting US assets there and restricting movement of vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.
Regional hostilities showed no signs of abating on Sunday, a day after US President Donald Trump said Iran had 48 hours to cut a deal or face “all hell”.
Against this backdrop, Zarif’s roadmap said that although Iran viewed itself as successful in the war, prolonging the conflict – while potentially “psychologically satisfying” for Tehran – would only result in further loss of civilian lives and destruction of infrastructure.
Iran should, therefore, offer to “place limits on its nuclear program” under international monitoring as well as “reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for an end to all sanctions”, Zarif wrote.
Since the war began, Iran has virtually blocked the key waterway, through which one-fifth of the world’s crude oil and natural gas supplies normally pass.
Nuclear limits on Iran would include a commitment to never seek nuclear weapons and to blend its entire stockpile of enriched uranium so its enrichment levels fall below 3.67 percent, Zarif said.
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) estimates, Iran is believed to have about 440kg (970lb) of uranium enriched to 60 percent, a level at which uranium can be quickly enriched to the 90 percent threshold needed to produce a nuclear weapon.
Zarif called Trump’s demand for zero enrichment “fanciful” thinking.
Iran should also “accept a mutual nonaggression pact with the United States” in which both countries pledge to not strike each other in the future, the former minister said.
The US should also end all sanctions and United Nations Security Council resolutions against Iran, he added.
Zarif also outlined potential roles for regional and international actors.
He suggested that China and Russia along with the US could help create a regional fuel-enrichment consortium with Iran and its Gulf neighbours at West Asia’s sole enrichment facility with Iran transferring all enriched material and equipment there.
Zarif additionally proposed that Gulf states, UN Security Council powers and possibly Egypt, Pakistan and Turkiye should form a regional security framework to “ensure nonaggression, cooperation and freedom of navigation”, including arrangements to guarantee safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz.
“To further consolidate peace, Iran and the United States should initiate mutually beneficial trade, economic and technological cooperation,” Zarif added.
The Iranian politician said this roadmap would benefit Trump, offering him a “well-timed off-ramp” and an opportunity to claim peace.
“Emotions may be high, and each side is boasting about its war-front victories. But history best remembers those who make peace,” he said.
The US has presented Iran with a 15-point plan for a ceasefire as Pakistan, Turkiye and Egypt have been trying to achieve direct talks, but there has been no signs of progress on the diplomatic front.
Officials from Gulf states have responded to Zarif’s proposal, criticising it for overlooking Tehran’s attacks against its neighbours.
“Reading M. Javad Zarif’s article in Foreign Affairs ignores one of the core flaws in Iran’s strategy: aggression against its Gulf Arab neighbors,” Anwar Gargash, the diplomatic adviser to the president of the United Arab Emirates, said on X on Saturday.
“Thousands of missiles & drones targeting infrastructure, civilians, even mediators, is not strength; it is hubris & strategic failure. The Arab world has seen this before: destruction peddled as victory,” he added.
Former Qatari Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani also responded to Zarif’s plan, writing on X on Sunday that he “agreed with much of it” and it took a “clever” approach.
Still, he pushed back, stating that the war has “led us all into a path that is more complicated and dangerous” and chiding Iran for its attacks on the Gulf.
“You may believe that you have achieved progress in some aspects, and perhaps temporary tactical gains, but the cost was clear: the loss of an important part of your friends in the region, and the erosion of the trust that was built over years,” he wrote.
“Today, we need a voice like yours [Zarif’s] merging from within Iran to propose solutions to this war,” he added.
Bahrain and the UAE also reported attacks resulting in fires, which were put out quickly.
Kuwait has said Iranian drone attacks damaged two power and water desalination plants and sparked a fire at an oil complex, without causing injuries.
Gulf countries have borne the brunt of Tehran’s response to the US and Israeli strikes on Iran since February 28.
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Fatima Abbas Johar Hayat, a spokesperson for Kuwait’s Ministry of Electricity, Water and Renewable Energy, said on Sunday the “criminal aggression” caused “serious material damage” overnight to the two plants and the outage of two electricity-generating units.
The attack is the latest to target civil infrastructure in Kuwait. Other drone attacks overnight caused a fire at the Shuwaikh Oil Sector Complex and “significant damage” to a government office complex.
Reporting from Kuwait City, Al Jazeera’s Malika Traina referred to the incident as “devastating news” because “water desalination here and across the Gulf is extremely important. In Kuwait, around 90 percent of the country’s drinking water comes from these plants”.
Alongside the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait has been at the “epicentre” of Iranian attacks over the past few days, said Al Jazeera’s Victoria Gatenby, reporting from Doha, Qatar.
“The concern here in the region is that if President [Donald] Trump and the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, follow through on those threats to escalate attacks on Iran, the result may be that Tehran attacks similar facilities here in the Gulf,” said Gatenby.
Bahrain also faced Iranian attacks on Sunday.
Bahrain’s Gulf Petrochemical Industries Co said that several of its operational units were subjected to an attack by Iranian drones, while earlier in the day, the country’s national oil company, Bapco Energies, said an oil tank at one of its storage facilities was hit.
Both attacks caused a fire but were later brought under control and extinguished, Bahraini media reported.
No casualties were reported in either attacks, and damage from both was being assessed.
Earlier, Bahrain’s Ministry of the Interior had reported on the Bapco Energies fire without specifying where the blaze had broken out.
The Interior Ministry has said civil defence crews “extinguished a fire in the facility” that broke out “as a result of the Iranian aggression”.
The announcement came an hour after Bahrain activated air raid sirens.
Authorities in neighbouring Abu Dhabi on Sunday also stated they responded to several fires that broke out at the Borouge petrochemical plant, caused by falling debris from an interception.
“Operations at the plant have been immediately suspended pending a damage assessment,” read a statement issued by Abu Dhabi Media Office.
No injuries have been reported so far, it added.
Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, intercepted missiles early on Sunday, the kingdom said.
“Iran has said that it is only really attacking US military bases and US assets in the region, but we know from what’s been happening over the past five weeks and from what Gulf leaders have been saying that they have very much been targeting civilian infrastructure and critical energy infrastructure in this region as well,” said Gatenby.
While Gulf countries have shown “incredible restraint” in the face of attacks over the past five weeks, it is not because they lack the ability to respond and, increasingly, countries are talking about the fact that their patience is not unlimited, said Gatenby.
Saudi Arabia, in particular, has been talking in the past week about its right to self-defence under Article 51 of the UN Charter, she said.
“The GCC countries continue to say their main priority is de-escalation and dialogue, but some others have been saying this defensive posture may have to change if they continue to be attacked,” said Gatenby.
The United States and Israel have carried out multiple attacks on medical facilities in the course of their war on Iran.
On Thursday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian appealed to international health organisations to respond to attacks on medical facilities in Iran, including the Pasteur Institute in capital Tehran, a key centre that Iranian officials said had been targeted that day.
At least 2,076 people have been killed and 26,500 have been wounded in Iran since the US and Israel first launched strikes on the country on February 28.
Here is a closer look at how the US and Israel have hit healthcare facilities in Iran.
On Thursday, Pezeshkian wrote in an X post: “What message does attacking hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and the Pasteur Institute as a medical research center in Iran convey?”
The Iranian president, 71, a heart surgeon by profession, continued: “As a specialist physician, I urge WHO [the World Health Organization], the Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders and physicians worldwide to respond to this crime against humanity.”
On Thursday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei wrote in an X post: “The American-Israeli aggressors have attacked the Pasteur Institute of Iran – the oldest and most prestigious research and public health centre in Iran and the entire Middle East, founded in 1920 through an agreement between the Pasteur Institute of Paris and the Iranian government.”
Baghaei deemed the attack “heartbreaking, cruel, despicable, and utterly outrageous”.
He did not specify whether there were casualties from the attack.
The institute was founded more than 100 years ago in collaboration with the Institut Pasteur in Paris, an internationally renowned centre for biomedical research, which itself was founded in 1887.
The institute in Iran conducts research on infectious diseases, produces vaccines and biological products and provides advanced diagnostics.
The centre has played a central role in fighting endemic diseases such as smallpox and cholera. It also supports Iran’s national immunisation programme by developing and producing vaccines and related biologicals – including those used against diseases such as tetanus, hepatitis B and measles.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the WHO, wrote in an X post on Friday that two departments of the Pasteur Institute of Iran have also been working closely with the WHO.
“The conflict in Iran, and the region, is impacting the delivery of health services and the safety of health workers, patients, and civilians present at health facilities,” Ghebreyesus wrote.
“Since 1 March, WHO has verified over 20 attacks on health care in Iran, resulting in at least nine deaths, including that of an infectious diseases health worker and a member of the Iranian Red Crescent Society,” Ghebreyesus wrote in his X post.
Some of the facilities hit include:
On Friday morning, a drone strike hit a Red Crescent relief warehouse in Iran’s Bushehr province.
While no casualties were reported, the attack destroyed two relief containers, two buses and emergency vehicles, Fars news agency reported.
On March 31, Israeli-US strikes hit one of Iran’s largest pharmaceutical companies in Tehran, the Iranian government said in a post on X.
The company was later identified as Tofigh Daru Research and Engineering Company, which is owned by the Social Security Investment Company, a state-run holding firm. On LinkedIn, Tofigh Daru states that it develops and produces active pharmaceutical ingredients “in the anticancer, narcotics, cardiovascular to immunomodulatory segments”.
No confirmed casualty numbers were reported from that strike.
This newly constructed hospital in Tehran was significantly damaged during an attack on the capital on March 29, according to the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA).
About 30 patients were in the hospital at the time of the strike late on Monday, the hospital’s director told IRNA. No specific casualty figures for the hospital have been reported.
The hospital in Andimeshk in Iran’s Khuzestan province sustained damage from an explosion on March 21, according to the Mehr and Fars news agencies.
In his post on Friday, Ghebreyesus confirmed this attack and said the facility had been forced to evacuate staff and cease services.
Reports about the attack do not mention casualties at the hospital.
On March 2, Gandhi Hospital in Tehran was damaged during attacks on a television communications tower nearby.
No confirmed casualty figures were reported for the hospital itself.
International humanitarian law states that health establishments and units, including hospitals, should not be attacked, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
These protections also apply to the sick and wounded, to medical staff and to means of transport such as ambulances.
In 2016, the United Nations Security Council resolution 2286 was adopted unanimously. This condemns attacks on healthcare and calls on nations to respect international law.
However, last year record attacks on healthcare during armed conflict were recorded, according to the WHO’s Surveillance System for Attacks on Health Care (SSA).
The SSA said that in armed conflicts worldwide, 1,348 attacks on medical facilities resulted in the killing of 1,981 people. The majority of these deaths were in Sudan, where 1,620 people were killed, followed by Myanmar, where 148 people were killed.
This was a sharp uptick from 2024, when 944 patients and medical personnel were killed in armed conflict.
Besides Iran, Israeli attacks have also targeted healthcare facilities in Lebanon.
A month into its latest bombardment of Lebanon, Israel has killed 53 medical workers, destroyed 87 ambulances or medical centres, and forced the closure of five hospitals, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health.
“Israeli strikes and blanket evacuation orders are cutting people off from care and shrinking the space for health services to function,” Luna Hammad, the Lebanon medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders (MSF), told Al Jazeera, adding that MSF has seen “a documented pattern of attacks affecting healthcare”.
Throughout its genocidal war in Gaza, Israel has also attacked healthcare facilities in the Palestinian enclave.
In October 2023, hundreds of people sheltering in the car park of Gaza’s al-Ahli Hospital were killed in an Israeli attack, according to Palestinian health officials.
Israel attributed the explosion at the facility to a misfired rocket launched by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an allegation denied by the armed group.
In March 2024, the Israeli military said it killed 90 people in its raid on al-Shifa Hospital during a siege, as displaced Palestinians sheltering in the facility described long detentions and abuse.
In December 2024, the Israeli army arrested Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, after refusing to follow orders to abandon one of the last functioning hospitals in northern Gaza. His arrest came a day after the military killed approximately 20 Palestinians and apprehended about 240 in a raid inside the hospital, which was one of the “largest operations” conducted in the territory until that time.
In March 2025, Israeli forces reportedly shot dead 15 Palestinian medics for the Palestine Red Crescent Society and inside clearly identifiable PRCS ambulances, during a rescue mission in Rafah’s Tal as-Sultan neighbourhood.
Jassim al-Budaiwi calls on UN Security Council to guarantee ‘uninterrupted navigation through all strategic waterways’.
Published On 2 Apr 20262 Apr 2026
The head of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) has called on the United Nations to act to immediately halt Iranian attacks across the region, condemning the strikes as a “flagrant violation” of international law and the United Nations Charter.
Speaking at the UN Security Council (UNSC) on Thursday, GCC Secretary-General Jassim al-Budaiwi urged the council to “take all necessary measures” to bring an end to Iran’s attacks on Gulf countries.
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The UNSC must “take all necessary means” to “protect maritime corridors and guarantee the uninterrupted maritime navigation through all strategic waterways” in the region, al-Budaiwi said.
He also stressed that the six GCC states – Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates – must be included in any talks or deals with Iran “to enhance regional security and prevent further escalation or the repetition of such attacks in the future”.
“The GCC reaffirms the urgent need to immediately halt these attacks; restore security, stability and calm in the region, and ensure the safety of air and maritime navigation, the safety of international supply chains, and the protection of global energy markets,” al-Budaiwi said.
Iran has carried out daily missile and drone attacks across the Middle East, including in Arab Gulf nations, since the United States and Israel launched a war against the country on February 28.
While Iranian officials have said they are acting in self-defence and striking US and Israeli-linked targets, the attacks have struck civilian sites across the Gulf, including several of the region’s critical energy facilities.
Iran also has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a key Gulf waterway through which about one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquified natural gas supplies transit, sending global energy prices skyrocketing.
Reporting from the Emirati city of Dubai on Thursday evening, Al Jazeera’s Zein Basravi said frustrations are growing across the Gulf as the US-Israeli war on Iran drags on.
“The GCC countries were from day one – months before this war even began – trying to keep it from happening. But it was like trying to stop a slow-moving car crash. And effectively, that crash has happened in their front yard,” Basravi said.
He noted that 85 percent of the projectiles fired by Iran have targeted Gulf countries, with the UAE the hardest hit.
“Their primary threats are the retaliatory attacks by Iran,” Basravi said of the GCC. “And their primary focus is bringing that to an immediate close – and that means ending the conflict as soon as possible.”
Shrapnel from an Iranian drone interception kills a Bangladeshi national in the UAE’s Fujairah city.
Iran’s drones have hit fuel tanks at Kuwait’s international airport, causing a large blaze, and authorities in Bahrain have reported a fire at an undisclosed company facility, as the United States-Israel war on Iran continues for a fifth week.
Abdullah al-Rajhi, a spokesman for the General Directorate of Civil Aviation in Kuwait, on Wednesday said the airport had been subjected to “brazen attacks by drones from Iran and the armed factions it supports”.
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The raids targeted fuel tanks at the airport, “leading to a large fire breaking out at the site”, al-Rajhi was quoted as saying by the official Kuwait News Agency (KUNA).
Emergency teams were on site, and “the damage is material with no human injuries,” he said.
Bahrain’s Ministry of Interior said civil defence crews were “extinguishing a fire in a facility of a company as a result of the Iranian aggression”.
“Relevant authorities are taking their measures at the site,” it added, without naming the company.
A tanker was hit by an unknown projectile near the Qatari capital Doha, causing damage to the hull at the waterline, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said, adding the crew were safe.
The vessel was struck about 17 nautical miles (equivalent to about 32km) north of Qatar’s Ras Laffan industrial hub, the country’s main gas production facility, which was hit by Iranian missiles last month, causing significant damage.
Confirming the incident, Qatar’s Ministry of Defence said the country was targeted by three cruise missiles launched from Iran, one of which struck an oil tanker.
In a post on X, the ministry said it intercepted two of the missiles, while the third hit a tanker leased to QatarEnergy. The tanker’s 21-person crew was evacuated, the ministry said. No injuries were reported.
In the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the official WAM news agency said shrapnel from a drone interception fell on a farm in the al-Rifaa area of Fujairah city and killed a Bangladeshi national. It said authorities were dealing with the incident.
Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defense said several drones were “intercepted and destroyed”, without reporting any injuries.
The oil-rich Gulf has borne the brunt of Iran’s attacks in response to the US-Israeli air strikes on the country.
Iran has claimed to be attacking US assets in the region, but Gulf nations say Tehran has targeted civilian infrastructure.
On Tuesday, a United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report said gross domestic product (GDP) in the Arab world was estimated to decline by approximately 3.7 to 6 percent after a month of war, equivalent to a contraction of $120bn to $194bn.
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump and his administration have sent contradictory statements about how and when the war might end.
“We’ll be leaving very soon,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday, saying the exit could take place “within two weeks, maybe two weeks, maybe three”.
Washington had previously threatened to intensify operations if Tehran did not accept a 15-point US ceasefire framework that had, among its core demands, commitments by Iran not to pursue nuclear weapons, halt all uranium enrichment and fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Tehran dismissed the proposal as “maximalist” and “unreasonable”, stressing it is not seeking war and wants a permanent end to the conflict. It also demanded compensation for the destruction caused by US-Israeli attacks against the country.
RIO and Kate Ferdinand may be the most high profile Brits to quit Dubai – but they definitely won’t be the last, a top businessman told The Sun.
Wolfgang Douglas – a UK investor and former Dubai resident – says his phone is “red hot” with people trying to get their money out of the Gulf State.
And he says it is not just the war – which has seen the influencer capital of the world besieged by missiles – that is driving away Brits.
It comes as England and Manchester United legend Rio and his wife Kate fled their £6.5million mansion – moving to Portugal.
Wolfgang told The Sun: “I am not surprised to see celebrities like [Rio & Kate] fleeing Dubai with their children.
“The dream of Dubai was sold on safety which is now undeniably not true.
“They sold it on being the Switzerland of the Middle East – untouched by the conflicts around them.
“Sadly, they now find themselves under attack and in the middle of a tinderbox.”
Dubai is known as the playground of the ultra rich – with social-media loving influencers flouting their lives with supercars, yachts and sun-drenched bikini snaps.
Some 240,000 Brit expats have moved out to the playground city – lured by the promise of a lavish lifestyle and low tax.
Expats make up between 85 and 90 per cent of Dubai’s population.
But beneath the glitzy exterior, Wolfgang – who runs The Wolf MBA business academy – says people are now waking up to the city’s dark side.
He claims that it is not just influencers desperate to return to London, but also private investors and ultra-wealthy families.
And he knows how bad things can get in the city – with him having to spend millions of pounds fighting to get his dad Albert freed from a Dubai jail after he was unjustly banged up for a crime he didn’t commit.
Wolfgang told The Sun those “seduced” by the allure of the city are fleeing – but the money is escaping even quicker, with the city now facing a “potentially catastrophic exodus”.
He said: “The Iran war has crashed the Gulf dream, and the real story isn’t expats fleeing Dubai, but how the money is escaping even faster.
“Working discreetly as an intermediary for the private investment houses or family offices of the ultra-wealthy, my phone has been red hot with thousands of calls and messages since late February.”
He went on: “People are threatened or even imprisoned for speaking out or filming drone strikes, but while they weigh options and chase plane tickets, the smart money has been moving – extremely fast.
“Influencers continue posting luxury content while insisting everything is normal, but there are echoes of the Titanic here.”
Wolfgang works in “asset liquidation” – essentially converting assets into cash.
He says he is helping connecting the wealthy with people who can flog property and cars so they can get out of the Gulf.
Wolfgang said one family – who he cannot name – has asked him to help redirect some £250million worth of investments out the region, and instead they are looking at opportunities in London.
Many Gulf natives kept their assets in the West, particularly London while they convinced Brits to move their over to the Middle East.
Wolfgang said: “Fact is, Dubai sold a lie via public and social media, actively undermining confidence in London and the wider UK by highlighting crime, high taxes and political instability, while trumpeting the Gulf as a glamorous tax-free sanctuary for wealth.”
He went on: “While telling the world London is unsafe, many native Gulf investors kept their wealth here all along and continued to live and operate out of Mayfair, Belgravia and Knightsbridge, even as their media was persuading Brits to sell up and ‘join them’ in the Gulf.”
“So, property prices in parts of central London fell 20-30 per cent in recent years.
“And who bought those properties?
“The very people who told Brits to sell yet never left their own London mansions.”
Wolfgang added: “So, after years of being battered by negative narratives, this could be the moment capital begins flowing back into London.
“You can build the tallest skyscrapers in the world, shout about luxury and tax-free wealth and claim accolades like having the world’s only seven-star hotel, but when uncertainty strikes, capital returns to long-established safe institutions.”
And he warned influencers simply “can’t admit the truth” and are continuing to sell the “Gulf mirage”.
Wolfgang has witnessed first hand the disturbing side of Dubai as his dad Albert was banged up in a disgusting prison .
Businessman Albert says the four-year ordeal in a hellhole Dubai jail stripped him of any shred of dignity and left him “feeling less than nothing”.
He had been arrested for financial fraud after simply putting his signature to a piece of paper related to son Wolfgang, who also ran a company in the United Arab Emirates.
He claims he witnessed suicides and prisoners being raped, rubbed shoulders with killers, and survived on meagre portions of rice and weak soup.
Before his arrest, he enjoyed a life of luxury, driving a Rolls-Royce and living in a £6million mansion on Palm Jumeirah island, where celebrities including David and Victoria Beckham and Brad Pitt own villas.
He made his fortune by cornering the market in wooden flooring in the Gulf after moving 4,500 miles from where to Dubai in 1998.
Son Wolfgang followed him out in 2008 to set up his own flooring firm, Timberwolf.
He returned to the UK full time in 2019.
Kyiv has sought to leverage its expertise in downing Russian drones to help Gulf nations.
Published On 28 Mar 202628 Mar 2026
Qatar and Ukraine have signed a defence agreement seeking joint expertise on countering threats from missiles and drones, according to Qatar’s Ministry of Defence, as Iran continues attacking its Gulf neighbours.
The agreement was made on Saturday during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to Doha, following his stop in the UAE earlier in the day.
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Earlier on Saturday, Zelenskyy said Ukraine and the United Arab Emirates had also agreed to cooperate on defence, a day after signing a deal with Saudi Arabia during his visit to the kingdom on Thursday.
Kyiv has sought to leverage its expertise in downing Russian drones to help Gulf nations and has deployed anti-drone experts to the three countries Zelenskyy visited during his diplomatic tour.
Tehran insists it is targeting only US assets in the Gulf in retaliation for the US-Israeli war on Iran, but the assaults have upset relations as Gulf nations say civilians are being put at risk.
During the Ukrainian leader’s visit to Doha on Saturday, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Defence Affairs Sheikh Saoud bin Abdulrahman bin Hassan Al Thani met Ukraine’s Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council (NSDC) Rustem Umerov, and Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Andrii Hnatov.
“The agreement includes collaboration in technological fields, development of joint investments and the exchange of expertise in countering missiles and unmanned aerial systems,” Qatar’s Defence Ministry said in a statement during Zelenskyy’s visit.
The officials discussed the latest security developments. The defence agreement was signed by Qatari Armed Forces Lieutenant General Jassim bin Mohammed Al Mannai, and on the Ukrainian side by Hnatov, in the presence of the other officials.
“Ukraine is offering a cheap way of countering Iranian drones. Ukraine has been doing that for the past three and a half years because Russia has been firing Shahed drones since September 2023 at least, and it’s been downing them nearly every day,” said Al Jazeera’s Dmitry Medvedenko, reporting from Doha.
“The Gulf has been using Patriot and THAAD missiles primarily so far to down Iranian missiles and drones. Each Patriot missile costs almost $4m, while Ukraine is offering its expertise in downing drones for about $2,000 each.”
Ukraine has become one of the world’s leading producers of sophisticated, battlefield-proven drone interceptors as Russia has been attacking Kyiv with hundreds of thousands of Iranian drones since the start of its full-scale invasion of the neighbouring country in 2022.
On March 18, Zelenskyy said 201 anti-drone experts had been deployed to the Middle East.
Kyiv has proposed swapping its interceptors for the vastly more expensive air-defence missiles that Gulf countries are using to down Iranian drones. Kyiv says it needs more of them to fend off near-daily Russian missile attacks.
“What we can assume is that Ukraine is primarily interested in funding,” said Medvedenko.
He said that the US-Israeli war on Iran is “costing so many Patriot missiles”, which concerns Ukraine as its stocks will decline.
The Patriots are “a much better solution” for countering Russia’s ballistic missiles, he said.
Iranian Red Crescent says more than 92,600 civilian units were damaged across the country in US-Israeli attacks.
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Impact of US-Israeli war on Iran poses serious risks beyond energy sector.
The US-Israeli war on Iran is hitting Gulf Arab nations hard – but with a wider impact in today’s interlinked world.
As well as global oil and gas supplies, Gulf states play a critical role in many economies.
So how are they connected – and what could be at risk?
Presenter: James Bays
Guests:
Nikolay Kozjharnov – Research associate professor in energy security at the Gulf Studies Center at Qatar University
Cornelia Meyer – Macroeconomist and oil and gas specialist
Torbjorn Soltvedt – Associate director at global risk intelligence company Verisk Maplecroft
Published On 27 Mar 202627 Mar 2026
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EXPLAINER
The US and Israel’s war on Iran is intensifying, as Trump again claims Iranian leaders want to ‘make a deal’.
Published On 26 Mar 202626 Mar 2026
The United States and Israel’s war on Iran continues, with an Al Jazeera correspondent in Tehran reporting strikes are “increasing in number and in intensity” amid conflicting claims about whether negotiations are taking place.
US President Donald Trump says talks are happening, but Iran rejects the talks, saying it will continue to “resist” US aggression.
On Thursday, Iran carried out retaliatory strikes against Israel and several Gulf countries, as the Middle East conflict sees no signs of ending, and global energy and food prices continue to rise.
A week into the United States-Israeli war on Iran, and Iran’s attacks on its Gulf neighbours, Jaya Khuntia spoke – as he often did – to his Doha-based son Kuna on the phone.
It was March 6, about 10pm, and Khuntia and the family were worried. “He told me, ‘I am safe here, don’t worry,’” the father recalled from the conversation with Kuna.
It was the last time they spoke.
The next day, the family in Naikanipalli village of India’s eastern Odisha state received a phone call from Kuna’s roommate telling them that the son had suffered a heart attack after hearing the sound of missiles and debris from interceptions falling near their residence. He collapsed and was later declared dead. Kuna’s body reached home days later.
Al Jazeera cannot independently confirm the cause of Kuna’s death, but the family of the 25-year-old, who worked as a pipe fitter in Qatar’s capital, is among millions across South Asia directly affected by the war in the Middle East.
Of the eight people killed in the United Arab Emirates in Iranian attacks, two were Emirati military personnel, a third a Palestinian civilian, and the remaining five were from South Asia: Three from Pakistan, and one each from Bangladesh and Nepal. All three people killed in Oman were from India. An Indian national and a Bangladeshi national are the only deaths in Saudi Arabia.
Migrant workers from South Asia total nearly 21 million people in the Gulf nations, a third of the total population of the region. At stake, for their families back home, is the safety of their loved ones and the future of their dreams.
The Khuntia family had taken on a 300,000-rupee ($3200) debt in 2025 for the marriages of their two daughters. Kuna’s income in Doha – where he had moved only in late 2025 – of 35,000 rupees ($372) was helping them collect what they needed to pay back the loan. Kuna had been sending back about 15,000 rupees ($164) every month.
“We thought our suffering was finally ending,” Jaya said, his voice trembling. “My only son would say, ‘Baba, don’t worry, I am here.’ He was our only hope… our everything.”
That hope is now extinguished. “That one call finished us,” Jaya cried. “He promised to return after clearing our debts … but he came back in a coffin. We have nothing left now. Losing our only son is the biggest debt we have to live with.”
![Kuna Khuntia, a 25-year-old pipe fitter from India's Odisha, who died of a heart attack in Doha Qatar [Photo courtesy the Khuntia family]](https://i0.wp.com/www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/Kuna-Khuntia-1774503793.jpeg?w=640&ssl=1)
In all, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE – the six Arab countries in the Gulf – host 35 million foreign nationals, who form a majority of their total population, 62 million.
They include 9 million people from India, 5 million each from Pakistan and Bangladesh, 1.2 million from Nepal, and 650,000 from Sri Lanka. Most of them are engaged in blue-collar work, building or supporting the industries and services that are at the heart of the Gulf’s success and prosperity.
But since the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, these migrant workers have often been among the most vulnerable. That vulnerability extends beyond deaths and injuries to the very nature of their work: Oil refineries, construction areas, airports and docks, where many work, have been targeted in Iranian attacks.
The suspension of work at many of these facilities, coupled with fears of a major economic downturn in the region, has also left many workers and their families worried about the future of their jobs.
Hamza*, a Pakistani migrant labourer working at an oil storage facility in the UAE, recalled a recent attack that he witnessed. “A drone struck a storage unit right in front of us. We were completely shaken. Most of us there are from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
“We couldn’t sleep for nights after that. The drone was so close that it could have killed us, too,” Hamza added. “For a moment, I thought we would be next.”
Despite these dangers, he said, leaving is not an option.
“We want to go back, but we can’t,” Hamza said. “Our families depend on us. It’s dangerous here, but if we stop working, they will have nothing to eat. We have no choice.”
Experts say Hamza’s sentiment is common across South Asian blue-collar workers in the Gulf, because of poverty and limited employment opportunities back home.
Imran Khan, a faculty member at the New Delhi Institute of Management working on migration economics, said migrant labourers from South Asia are often driven by desperation to take up jobs in the Middle East. He said Western countries have, in recent years, dramatically raised entry barriers for less-educated blue-collar foreign workers.
“These workers are the worst affected during crises – whether war or natural disasters,” he says. “I have been speaking to several migrant labourers, particularly Indians in the Middle East, and many are living in distress since the conflict began.”
But, like Hamza, most cannot afford to leave, Khan said.
“They cannot simply quit. Their income would stop immediately, and there are very limited opportunities back home,” he explained. “They have families to support, and without these jobs, survival becomes difficult.”
Middle Eastern countries remain a key source of remittances for South Asian nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. The remittances these five countries receive from the region, $103bn, are comparable to Oman’s total gross domestic product (GDP).
Just the remittances that India receives from the Gulf, $50bn, are more than Bahrain’s entire GDP. Pakistan receives $38.3bn in remittances, Bangladesh $13.5bn, Sri Lanka $8bn, and Nepal $5bn.
With the recent escalation of conflict in the Middle East, experts warn these flows could be significantly affected, especially if Gulf economies contract and layoffs follow.
Faisal Abbas, an expert in international economics and director at the Centre of Excellence on Population and Wellbeing Studies, a Pakistan-based research institute, said remittances from the Middle East form a crucial economic backbone for South Asian nations, not just families.
“Remittances are a critical pillar for Pakistan and other South Asian economies, and a large share comes from Middle Eastern countries,” he explained. “If the situation worsens, it will not be a positive development for the region.”
Pakistan’s remittances from the Gulf constitute nearly 10 percent of its GDP, about $400bn.
Abbas added that the effect may extend beyond remittance flows. “Migration patterns could also be disrupted. Many workers may return home, while those planning to migrate might reconsider,” he said. “This could further increase unemployment in a region already facing job shortages.”
Unlike Hamza, a number of South Asian workers are planning to return home.
Noor*, a migrant worker from Bangladesh employed at an oil facility in Saudi Arabia, said he no longer feels safe and plans to return home once his contract ends.
“I will never come back here again,” he said. “It’s too dangerous. We can’t even sleep at night. The fear never leaves us.”
Noor said drone attacks had occurred close to his workplace. “We saw it happen in front of us,” he said. “That fear stays with you… It doesn’t go away.”
His family, too, is deeply affected. “My children cry every time they call me. They are scared for my life,” he added.
He said he knows that returning to Bangladesh would mean more economic hardship for his family. But Noor said he had made up his mind.
“I would rather go back and struggle to survive with my family than live here in constant fear,” he said. “At least there, I will be with them.”
*Some names have been changed at the request of workers who fear retribution from contractors for speaking to the media.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps calls Trump a ‘deceitful American president’, saying his ‘contradictory behaviour will not make us lose sight of the battlefront’.
Published On 24 Mar 202624 Mar 2026
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Oil and gas facilities in the Gulf have been attacked since early in the war on Iran.
The war in the Middle East took a serious turn when Israel bombed Iran’s energy facilities, pushing Iran to step up attacks on its Gulf neighbours.
The damage has been significant and will take years to repair. It also has long-term consequences, with Qatar already warning of a reduction in exports.
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The escalation is dangerous, experts say, as energy exports from the Gulf region account for a fifth of global output.
So, what are the risks of turning energy facilities into battlefields?
Presenter: Imran Khan
Guests:
Mohsen Baharvand – Former Iranian ambassador to the United Kingdom
Jim Walsh – Research associate in MIT’s security studies programme
John Sfakianakis – Chief economist at the Gulf Research Center
Published On 20 Mar 202620 Mar 2026
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EXPLAINER
Tehran has warned of zero restraint if energy facilities are attacked again, while Netanyahu signals that there could be a ‘ground component’ to the war.
Published On 20 Mar 202620 Mar 2026
Iran has warned it will show “zero restraint” if its energy facilities are attacked again, a day after Israel struck the South Pars gasfield and Tehran attacked energy sites across the Gulf.
In the United States, President Donald Trump raised controversy during a meeting with Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi by invoking the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbour while defending the element of surprise in the Iran attack.
Meanwhile, as the conflict intensifies, concerns over supply disruptions have pushed global oil and gas prices higher, with sharp increases reported across the United Kingdom and Europe.
Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister warns Iran that regional neighbours have ‘significant’ capabilities with which to respond to Tehran’s aggression.
Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud has warned Iran that tolerance of its attacks on his country and those of neighbouring Gulf states is limited, calling on Tehran to immediately “recalculate” its strategy.
Warning that Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have “very significant capacities and capabilities” that could be drawn on should they “choose to do so”, the foreign minister told a news conference early on Thursday that Iran had carefully planned its strategy for striking regional neighbours, despite denials from Tehran’s diplomats.
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“The level of accuracy in some of this targeting – you can see it in our neighbours as well as the kingdom – indicates that this is something that was premeditated, preplanned, preorganised and well thought out,” Prince Faisal said.
“I’m not going to lay out what would and would not precipitate a defensive action by the Kingdom [of Saudi Arabia] because I think that is not a wise approach to signal to the Iranians,” the foreign minister continued.
“But I think it’s important for the Iranians to understand that the kingdom, but also its partners who have been attacked and beyond, have very significant capacities and capabilities that they could bring to bear should they choose to do so,” he said.
“The patience that is being exhibited is not unlimited. Do they [the Iranians] have a day, two, a week? I’m not going to telegraph that,” he added.
“I would hope they understand the message of the meeting today and recalculate quickly and stop attacking their neighbours. But I am doubtful they have that wisdom.”
Prince Faisal’s warning followed a meeting of foreign ministers from Arab and Islamic countries in the Saudi capital earlier in the day to discuss the expanding war in the region, which on Wednesday saw Iranian attacks on Gulf energy sites, including Qatar’s Ras Laffan gas facility, where significant damage was reported, and the United Arab Emirates’ Habshan gas facility.
Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressed its “strong condemnation and denunciation of the blatant Iranian attack targeting Ras Laffan Industrial City”, located 80km (50 miles) northeast of the Qatari capital Doha, which is the world’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) production facility, producing some 20 percent of the world’s LNG supply.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had warned earlier that oil and gas facilities in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE would face retaliation for an Israeli strike on Iran’s South Pars gasfield.
Iranian state media reported that facilities linked to the country’s huge offshore South Pars field – located off the coast of southern Iran’s Bushehr province – had come under attack.
Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defence also said on Wednesday that its air defences had intercepted four Iranian ballistic missiles that targeted Riyadh and two launched towards the country’s eastern region.
Air defences in the UAE dealt with 13 ballistic missiles and 27 drones, according to the country’s Defence Ministry, while operations were suspended at the Habshan gas facility as authorities responded to incidents caused by fallen debris after the successful interception of a missile.
The Saudi foreign minister also told the news conference on Thursday that while the war will end one day, it will take much longer to restore relations with Iran as trust “has completely been shattered” due to Tehran’s tactics of targeting its neighbours.
“We know for a fact that Iran has been building this strategy over the last decade and beyond,” Prince Faisal said.
“This is not something that is a reaction to an evolving circumstance where Iran is improvising. This has been built into their war planning: targeting their neighbours and using that to try and put pressure on the international community,” he said.
“So when this war eventually ends, in order for there to be any rebuilding of trust, it will take a long time. And I have to tell you, if Iran doesn’t stop … immediately, I think there will be almost nothing that can re-establish that trust,” he added.
Qatar, UAE, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia report new blasts, interceptions, with war edging to 3-week mark.
Published On 18 Mar 202618 Mar 2026
Iran has fired missiles and drones at several Gulf Arab nations, which have sought to intercept them, in a now-daily fallout from the United States-Israel war launched on Iran nearly three weeks ago that has engulfed the Middle East with deaths, destruction, assassinations, and an energy crisis spreading far beyond the region.
Early Tuesday, Qatar’s Ministry of Defence said its armed forces intercepted a missile attack against the country.
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The Kuwait National Guard said it shot down an unmanned aircraft at dawn. The statement came hours after the Kuwaiti army said it was intercepting hostile missile and drone attacks.
The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have also reported intercepting missiles and drones in recent hours.
Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defense reported the interception and destruction of a drone in the Eastern Region.
Earlier Tuesday, the UAE Ministry of Defence said the country’s air defences were “currently responding to incoming missile and drone threats from Iran”. The announcement came four hours after another reported attack from Iran. Later, a loud bang was heard in Dubai as authorities said air defences were dealing with a missile threat.
Al Jazeera’s Zein Basravi, reporting from Dubai, said, “The UAE has been the hardest hit by Iran’s retaliation. For instance, there have been 3000 different projectiles – missiles and drones – fired at GCC countries by Iran in terms of its retaliation. More than half, well over half, have targeted places in the UAE. Overnight was no different … Multiple explosions heard throughout the city.
“That glow of defensive weapons and interceptions in the night skies, something that has become all too familiar, not just in Dubai, but in cities across the GCC. Once again seen over the skies here.
“Dubai’s media office confirming that they were the result of air defence interception operations,” he added.
There have been several deaths in the Gulf nations, where an economic effect is also being acutely felt since the war began.
The economies of the Gulf are suffering some of the worst damage.
Iran has launched continuous attacks on Gulf states since the onset of the conflict on February 28, arguing that it is attacking military bases used by the US for the war. Gulf nations have rejected Tehran’s claims, insisting the attacks on them are unjustified.
The Iranian strikes have upended energy production and inflicted major disruption to tourism and travel, putting the region at risk of some of the most severe economic harm since the 1990-1991 Gulf War.
After nearly three weeks of war, the economic effect on the region has already been substantial.
Middle Eastern oil producers’ daily output declined from 21 million barrels to 14 million barrels after a little more than a week of conflict as they deal with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, according to Rystad Energy.
Ukrainian President Zelenskyy says Moscow and Tehran are ‘brothers in hatred’; claims Iran’s drones ‘contain Russian components’.
More than 200 Ukrainian military experts are in the Gulf region and wider Middle East helping governments in their defence against Iran’s drone attacks, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.
In an address to dozens of members of the United Kingdom Parliament in London on Tuesday, the Ukrainian leader said 201 Ukrainian anti-drone experts are in the region and another 34 “are ready to deploy”.
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“These are military experts, experts who know how to help, how to defend against Shahed drones,” Zelenskyy said in his speech, referring to the Iranian-designed “kamikaze” drones that Russia has been using in its war against Ukraine since 2022.
“Our teams are already in the Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and on the way to Kuwait,” the Ukrainian leader said.
“We are working with several other countries – agreements are already in place. We do not want this terror of the Iranian regime against its neighbours to succeed,” he said.
Last week, the Ukrainian leader said military teams had been sent to several Gulf states and Jordan.
Zelenskyy, who met with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and NATO chief Mark Rutte earlier on Tuesday, said Russia had received the Shahed-136 drones from the Iranians, who had “taught Russia how to launch them and gave it the technology to produce them”.
“Russia then upgraded them. And now we have clear evidence that Iranian Shaheds used in the region contain Russian components,” Zelenskyy said, describing the drones as designed for “low-cost destruction of expensive critical infrastructure”.
“So what is happening around Iran today is not a faraway war for us, because of the cooperation between Russia and Iran,” he said.
“The regimes in Russia and Iran are brothers in hatred, and that is why they are brothers in weapons. And we want regimes built on hatred to never win – in anything,” he added.
The Ukrainian leader then addressed his country’s newly developed prowess in drone warfare and manufacturing, claiming that 90 percent of Russian losses on the front lines in Ukraine are being “caused by our drones”.
Ukraine has moved on from making sea and aerial drones to producing interceptors that target drones, he said, adding that Ukraine is capable of producing at least 2,000 interceptors per day – half of which are required for its own defence and the remainder available for use by Kyiv’s allies.
“If a Shahed needs to be stopped in the Emirates – we can do it. If it needs to be stopped in Europe or the United Kingdom – we can do it. It is a matter of technology, investment, and cooperation,” he said.
While Ukraine has become one of the world’s leading producers of sophisticated, battlefield-proven drone interceptors, US President Donald Trump has said he does not need Ukraine’s help with countering Tehran’s drones targeting military targets in the Middle East.
After meeting with Zelenskyy at 10 Downing Street, Starmer said Russian President Vladimir Putin “can’t be the one who benefits from the conflict in Iran, whether that’s oil prices or the dropping of sanctions”.
During Zelenskyy’s visit on Tuesday, London and Kyiv signed a deal on a “defence partnership”, which is said to combine “Ukraine’s expertise and the UK’s industrial base to manufacture and supply drones and innovative capabilities”.
Witness videos captured missile interceptors launching and burning debris raining from the sky near the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre.
Published On 18 Mar 202618 Mar 2026
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Footage shows a fire burning near Dubai International Airport after a drone ignited a fuel tank, according to authorities in the UAE. Flights have been suspended. Civil defence crews say the blaze is under control.
Published On 16 Mar 202616 Mar 2026
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Black smoke could be seen in Dubai’s financial district where witnesses reported hearing explosions on Friday morning. Authorities there said a building was hit by debris from an intercepted missile.
Published On 13 Mar 202613 Mar 2026
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