1. How Dubai became a hub for dirty money
Dubai's attraction for illicit finance was never a secret. It combined what launderers look for: a global trading and financial centre, a property market open to foreign buyers, a large gold trade, and, for years, limited scrutiny of who was behind the money.
2. What the UAE changed
Being grey-listed by the Financial Action Task Force in March 2022 was a blow to the reputation of a country that sells itself as a global financial centre. To get off the list in February 2024, it had to complete an action plan: stronger supervision, better understanding of how companies are misused, more investigations. Law firm Norton Rose Fulbright noted that UAE regulators had shown an increased willingness to investigate and take enforcement action. In 2025, the EU also removed the country from its list of high-risk jurisdictions.
Cooperation on extraditions is the most visible part of that shift. According to Gulf News, the UAE has signed more than 45 extradition treaties, and it issued 173 extradition decisions in money laundering and terrorism cases in 2025.
3. Zoom: the fugitives are going home
France: from zero to 29
On the evening of Tuesday 29 September, the extradition of Ouicem Kattoursi became final, after the 12-day appeal period expired, Le Parisien reported. The 44-year-old French-Tunisian from Sevran, near Paris, is considered by France's anti-narcotics office as one of the main cocaine importers in France. He was arrested in Dubai on 19 June. In 2023, Emirati authorities had already detained him, then released him because the French file was incomplete.
His case caps a shift. In January 2025, Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin flew to Abu Dhabi and Dubai with a list of 27 people under arrest warrants and obtained the first extradition to France in more than three years. France had posted a liaison magistrate to the UAE in 2024. Since then, according to Le Parisien, France has obtained 29 extraditions.
Across Europe
Ireland. Daniel Kinahan, 49, the alleged leader of the Kinahan cartel, accused of running a drug smuggling and money laundering network, was arrested in Dubai on 15 April and extradited on 9 August. He is charged with directing a criminal organisation. According to The Irish Times, he is the first Irish person extradited under a permanent treaty with the UAE that entered into force in 2025. His lieutenant Sean McGovern, extradited in May 2025, was sentenced to 24 years in June 2026.
Belgium. The UAE extradited Othman El Ballouti, Mathias Akyazili and Giorgi Faes in 2025, then three more suspects wanted for money laundering, drug trafficking and organised crime in June 2026.
The Netherlands. In August 2025, Dubai Police extradited a Dutch national accused of drug trafficking and money laundering.
Sweden. In September 2026, the UAE arrested a Swedish fugitive suspected of leading an international money laundering network, in a joint operation with Swedish authorities.
Dubai has not become hostile to the wanted. It has become unpredictable for them, and for a fugitive, that is enough to change everything.
4. The money is the harder test
Extraditing a trafficker is a visible act. Tracing, freezing and returning what he left behind is slower and less visible, and there the record is thinner.
The family stays. Daniel Kinahan's father, Christopher Kinahan Sr, and his brother, Christopher Jr, still live in Dubai, despite US rewards of up to $5 million for information on each of them. ICIJ found Emirati corporate records showing the Kinahan brothers had set up several companies in Dubai.
Property. Transparency International warned in 2025 that the UAE still ranks poorly on real estate safeguards, with known fugitives and politically exposed persons holding property unchecked. The EU's delisting, it said, "should not be mistaken for a clean bill of health".
Case by case. In February 2025, French media noted that only a handful of the traffickers arrested in Dubai had actually been sent back. Darmanin's list alone had 27 names; Kattoursi and Belgian suspect Nordin El Hajjioui were both released once before Emirati courts approved their extradition.
5. What to watch
WRITTEN BY WAIS MIGANE