Deal-Diplomacy in Motion: India as the Opening Arena of Gulf Competition

On January 19, 2026, the United Arab Emirates and India signed multiple agreements, memoranda of understanding, and letters of intent during UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s working visit to New Delhi, where he met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. These events confirm the scenario outlined by Dr. Mohammed Walid Youssef, President of ICGER, in a December 31, 2025, study titled “The Mukalla Incident and the Saudi–UAE Rift: A Tear Beyond Repair.” In that study, Youssef predicted that the UAE and Saudi Arabia would engage in a “deal diplomacy” race, signing agreements worth hundreds of billions of dollars with the United States, China, India, and other major powers.

According to the Emirates News Agency (WAM), the agreements included:

• A letter of intent regarding a strategic defense partnership.
• A letter of intent has been signed between the UAE Space Agency and the Indian National Center for the Promotion and Authorization of Space Activities to launch a collaborative initiative focused on enabling and advancing the space industry.
• A sale and purchase agreement between ADNOC Gas and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited.
• A memorandum of understanding on food safety and technical requirements between the UAE Ministry of Climate Change and Environment and India’s Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority.
• A letter of intent on investment cooperation between the UAE Ministry of Investment and the Government of Gujarat on the development of the Dholera Special Investment Region.

In his study, Dr. Youssef noted that after the 2017 Qatar crisis, which involved rivals like Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain, Doha and the other parties competed to sign agreements worth billions of dollars with the US and Europe to gain political backing from 2017 to 2020. He pointed out that Saudi Arabia and the UAE would also engage in a similar ‘deal diplomacy’ race, aiming to secure hundreds of billions of dollars through agreements with the United States, China, India, and others.