Perception from the rest of the world.....
Not wanting to start too much of a flame war, but, is it really not too surprising when the rest of worlds sees some arab / muslim states as being a be bit , well, paranoid, pre-historic, backward thinking ?
The life blood of any great country is usually the the small medium business, the entrepreneur, the risk taker and the philanthropist. And here is the UAE showing all the traits of a mis-trusting, paranoid Government that has fuelled the riots / protests etc across north Africa and the Middle East.
Tony Blair was an arse, but he could be voted out. He was superseded by another arse, and, subsequently, by another pair of them. But, with actions like this in the UAE, will things ever /really/ change over there ?