UAE Suspends All Trade, Financial Dealings With Iran After Missile Incident

The United Arab Emirates announced on Tuesday that it had suspended all trade and financial dealings with Iran."In light of regional escalations... all trade, commercial exchanges, and financial transactions with Iran have been halted until further notice," UAE foreign ministry communications director Afra Al Hameli said.The first UAE statement came nearly two hours after a brief phone alert warned residents of a "potential missile threat"."Due to the current situation, potential missile threats, immediately seek a safe place in the closest secure building," the interior ministry said in the phone alert, which was lifted shortly afterwards.It was the first such alert since a false alarm in June and an alert in July for an attack that ultimately did not enter UAE territory. Before that, the last missile warning came in early May.Tankers belonging to state-owned oil company ADNOC have been repeatedly targeted in the past few weeks.When the Middle East war began on February 28, the UAE bore the brunt of Iran's attacks, with nearly 3,000 missiles and drones directed at the country -- more than anywhere else in the region.After a memorandum of understanding came into effect in June between the two parties, which has since collapsed, the UAE reported no attacks, unlike other Gulf states.(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)