Graeme Wilson: The UAE’s support for Sudan is an unlikely success

“It was from the smoke in the room… from the fire,” Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan explained. Recalling a visit to Sudan in 1976, the UAE’s Founding Father shared the moment with UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali in the early 1990s. “I noticed, everywhere, that people were coughing. I asked, ‘Is there a lot of influenza?’ But it wasn’t. They did not have electricity. So, in their homes, they had fires for cooking and lighting.”

Across Sudan, dense smoke from fire pits and ancient wood-burning stoves filled unventilated rooms. The air turned gritty and acrid, clinging to throats, provoking deep, scratchy coughs – the kind that doesn’t easily go away. But it wasn’t just irritating; it was deadly. Behind the persistent wheezing loomed some of the world’s most insidious killers: pneumonia, lung cancer and heart disease.

Sheikh Zayed heard those coughs and recognised them – echoes of suffering not just in Sudan, but in many developing nations he visited. It left a lasting impression, one that helped catalyse a relentless, multi-generational Emirati commitment to uplift societies trapped in cycles of poverty, stagnation and neglect. One that continues until the present day under President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed.

Sudan, in particular, became a central focus of that mission. And yet, in a bitter twist of history, Sudan has taken its most potent friend to the International Court of Justice. In what most see as an egregious, politically motivated stunt, the Sudanese leadership filed a case against the UAE last month, accusing it of arming the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group. The UAE responded swiftly, asserting that the allegations “lack any legal or factual basis, representing yet another attempt to distract from the nation’s calamitous war”. This moment reveals a tragic contrast. A leadership in Khartoum that has failed its own people turns to litigation instead of introspection, seeking to deflect attention from domestic collapse by pointing fingers at the very hand that fed it.

Sudan is a land of rich contrasts and untapped promise. Its geography is a patchwork of arid deserts, fertile plains, towering mountains and the confluence of the Blue and White Nile rivers. From the Nubian Desert in the north to the rainforests of the south, Sudan’s natural wealth should have propelled it into prosperity. Instead, its history has been marred by civil war, misrule and economic breakdown.

I have spent three decades studying the history and legacy of the UAE’s leaders. As the author of two biographies of Sheikh Zayed, the late Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed and, most recently, on Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, UAE Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, for years I have sifted through dozens of public, corporate and private archives across more than 30 nations. Not only does my research illustrate that Sheikh Zayed is arguably one of the greatest philanthropists in history, touching the lives of billions, but that the scope of UAE’s altruism is overwhelming – and Sudan holds a particularly prominent chapter in that record.

The UAE’s relationship with Sudan began in earnest in February 1972, only three months after the federation was established. Sheikh Zayed was not merely focused on the domestic consolidation of the Emirates; he cast his gaze across the Arab world and beyond. Sudan, then emerging from the first of many civil wars, became a focal point. That same year, Abu Dhabi created a $25 million endowment to support the revitalisation of Sudan’s ailing railway system – the economic ecosystem of the nation. With over 5,000 kilometres of track, most laid before 1930, its railways were in desperate need of repair. In 1977, a $10 million soft loan from the Abu Dhabi Fund also helped rehabilitate 500km of track around Khartoum.

But the UAE’s vision extended beyond steel and timber. In 1972, funding was provided for the construction of the 400-bed Wad Medani Teaching Hospital in Al Jazirah state, ushering in a new era of accessible healthcare.

“Today, as Sudan continues to reel from renewed internal conflict, the UAE remains committed to delivering humanitarian relief and long-term development. Its investments have always aimed at empowering local communities, not indebting them”

The momentum continued. A May 1973 report I discovered in the papers of former British Prime Minister Sir Edward Heath detailed what amounted to an Emirati Marshall Plan for Sudanese health care. Sheikh Zayed committed to building a public hospital complex in Khartoum and a network of 24 regional health centres across the country. Sheikha Fatima bint Mubarak had pledged support for a dedicated women’s hospital. Meanwhile, Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum donated 6,000 bicycles to rural health workers, a simple yet transformative innovation that vastly expanded healthcare access across remote villages and communities. At that time, the UAE’s two great founders combined to launched Sudan’s first national anti-malaria programme, a precursor to other healthcare interventions that followed in the decades to come. And all of this was occurring while the UAE itself was still laying the foundations of its own development.

It is remarkable to reflect that a newly formed federation, only just beginning to chart its modern course, was already working to lift others alongside it. That 1976 state visit that so deeply moved Sheikh Zayed yielded another wave of transformative initiatives, including development of the 750-mile Red Sea Highway, linking coastal and inland regions and boosting trade, mobility and economic integration. The package included a major expansion of Sudan’s cotton industry, a sector that would go on to become the country’s largest source of foreign exchange, providing livelihoods for over 300,000 families. A UAE-backed modernisation campaign increased national ginning capacity by 15 per cent, injecting new life into rural economies.

As Mr Boutros Boutros-Ghali told me during an interview in Paris: “Sheikh Zayed did not do things because they were popular. He did things because they were right. He had the ability, and the desire, to effect change. So, he did. To him, it was as simple as that.”

Our archival deep dive has continued to uncover fresh examples of this philosophy in action. The Emirates has consistently delivered following the floods, famines, wars and genocides that have cursed Sudan over the last 50 years. Two telling documents from 1982 illustrate how this has been personal. That year, amid a heinous drought afflicted Sudan and the Horn of Africa, the UAE secured vast amounts of wheat from Czechoslovakia. When Prague delayed flights of that badly needed food, then minister of defence Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum is recorded as becoming so frustrated that he threatened to travel to the Czech capital and declared himself ready to fly an aircraft personally.

The people-to-people nature of this relationship has meant that Emirati support has been consistent, substantial and lifesaving. On a macro level this included the UAE’s seminal contribution to the global eradication of smallpox, which ended generations of misery and death for the Sudanese people. And, but for being killed for their ivory and meat to fund and feed armies in Sudan, that legacy should have included the natural endowment of elephants, Sheikh Zayed’s personal intervention in the mid-1980s leading directly to the global ban on ivory. On a national level, this support embraced upwards of 1,500 “Zayed Wells” delivering clean drinking water to remote communities. The Emirates-backed Rahad Irrigation Project, covering 1,260 square kilometres and bigger than Hong Kong, brought arid land into productive use, increasing food security for millions. The UAE’s role in modernising Khartoum International Airport bolstered logistics, created jobs and enhanced the nation’s connectivity.

Today, as Sudan continues to reel from renewed internal conflict, the UAE remains committed to delivering humanitarian relief and long-term development. Its investments have always aimed at empowering local communities, not indebting them – focused on lifting people out of poverty rather than leveraging influence through dependency.

The recent legal manoeuvre at The Hague cannot erase this record. It cannot change the fact that, for over half a century, Emirati aid, investment and solidarity have delivered tangible, measurable improvements to millions of Sudanese lives. While governments may rise and fall, the legacy of the UAE’s support for Sudan – rooted in compassion, responsibility and shared humanity – endures.

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That friendship has not been transactional, nor temporary. It was built on vision, on shared Arab identity and on a sincere desire to see others rise. No court filing can rewrite that truth.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Maghrebi.org. Graeme Wilson is a British historian who specialises in biographies of world leaders.

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