The United Arab Emirates has restricted state funding for citizens seeking to study at British universities amid tensions with the United Kingdom over London’s refusal to ban the Muslim Brotherhood.
Abu Dhabi has removed British universities from its list of institutions eligible for government scholarships, while continuing to fund studies in countries including Israel, France and the United States, the Financial Times reported Thursday.
The decision follows a sharp drop in the number of Emirati students studying in Britain. In the year ending September 2025, 213 UAE nationals were granted UK student visas, down 55 percent from the year ending September 2022.
The move points to a deterioration in relations between the two countries. The Financial Times quoted sources familiar with the matter as saying Emirati officials were concerned about the risk of students being radicalized on British university campuses.
British officials have responded by emphasizing the importance of academic freedom.
At the center of the dispute is the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist movement founded in Cairo in 1928. The UAE has repeatedly urged Britain to ban the group, which it considers a security threat.
The Muslim Brotherhood says it is a peaceful organization that seeks to participate in politics through democratic means. It is banned in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE, and is viewed as a threat by several governments across the Middle East and North Africa. In countries where relatively free elections have been held, parties linked to the Brotherhood have often performed strongly.
The British government has resisted calls for a ban. The Labour government has said the issue of proscribing the group remains under “close review.”
In 2017, a British parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee inquiry concluded that non-violent political Islamists could act as a barrier against violent extremism and should be engaged with, whether in government or opposition. The inquiry was commissioned by a previous coalition government and reportedly followed lobbying by UAE officials.
In December, the UAE took the unusual step of funding a visit to Abu Dhabi by Nigel Farage, leader of the right-wing Reform UK party, for meetings with senior Emirati officials over what was described as a shared opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Farage has pledged that Reform would ban the Brotherhood if elected. His party has led several national opinion polls.
The UAE has a record of pushing for tougher action against non-violent Islamist groups in Britain. In January 2025, it designated eight UK-based organizations as terrorist groups over alleged links to the Muslim Brotherhood, though none were found to have violated British law.
Reform lawmaker Richard Tice subsequently urged the Labour government to act on the UAE’s designations, despite the fact that political opposition of any kind is banned in the UAE and can result in lengthy prison sentences.
In 2023, it emerged that the UAE had paid Alp Services, a Geneva-based private intelligence firm, to target Britain’s largest Muslim charity, Islamic Relief Worldwide, by attempting to link its officials to the Muslim Brotherhood and violent extremism. The charity has denied the allegations.
Calls to ban the organization have since grown louder.
Speaking at the Reform Party conference in September, Farage accused both major British parties of failing to act. “Across the Middle East, countries have banned and proscribed the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organization,” he said. “We will do the very same.”