David Conn on Abu Dhabi and Human Rights

[Prestwich_Blue]

Jewish man writes negative story about Muslim country. Next.

These sort of comments really piss me off. They're moronic and insulting, as well as racist. You might have a case if Conn hadn't written so disparagingly about the Glazers. Who are also Jewish.

 

[BigOscar]

Tbh, it's pretty clear that someone is using Man City for publicity, and it's not the UAE. This clearly has absolutely nothing to do with us, yet they've thrown our name in to sensationalise it and to try and publicise the issue. If HR are being violated in the UAE, then it's something that needs attention, but dragging our name through the mud to publicise it is completely unnacceptable

 

[StrutterBlue]

i doubt it will keep me up at night

 

[bluethunder]

why do people think that man city was bought to promote abu dhabi ?

 

[MomoUae]

sorry for my english,i just registered to tell you guys my point of view considering i"m emarati
first of all ,most of those who were arrested are egyptians ,they wanted many things but mainly they wanted a muslim regime ,just like muslim brotherhood in Egypt."current regime is sunni,liberal"
nobody here agrees with torture ,i think arresting them would do just enough,but we also don't want people from outside our country telling us what to do with our country. no emaratis went out to protest ,it was just egyptians who wanted to end our regime
they have no right whatsoever to try and end the current regime because its not really their country is it?

and may i just say ,im not really proud of uae human rights record ,but at least its by miles better than any other arab country, it is a start right?.

 

[bluethunder]

our owners don't need man city to promote abu dhabi. these guys are rich as hell. they can afford to sponsor every club in the league, there's so many better ways of promoting abu dhabi, but that's not what their intent is. their intention was to buy a club, spend money to improve the club, break even at some point , then after a while make a profit.

 

[mcmanus]

Jewish man writes negative story about Muslim country. Next.

These sort of comments really piss me off. They're moronic and insulting, as well as racist. You might have a case if Conn hadn't written so disparagingly about the Glazers. Who are also Jewish.

I've read him in the guardian and his book 'richer than god' and fair does he points out that Abu Dhabi has it's problems iirc it was his dislike of migrant workers that time. I just really find his journalism regards our owner a bit suspect. He seems to have an intense hatred for him that I truly cannot fathom. Even the title of the book was odd.

 

[bluethunder]

david conn on usmanov <a class="postlink" href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/2007/sep/26/topstories3.mainsection?guni=Article:in%20body%20link" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.theguardian.com/news/2007/se ... ody%20link</a>

david conn on liverpool's blighting of anfield area
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2013/jun/24/liverpool-houses-landlord" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.theguardian.com/football/201 ... s-landlord</a>

david conn on the glazers
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2012/jul/04/manchester-united-glazers-shares-debt" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.theguardian.com/football/blo ... hares-debt</a>

david conn on abramovich
<a class="postlink" href="http://www.talksport.co.uk/radio/sports-breakfast/130702/conn-abramovichs-ten-years-chelsea-owner-200759" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://www.talksport.co.uk/radio/sports ... ner-200759</a>


This isn't a vendetta against us and whilst I've enjoyed our success these past few years, I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel uncomfortable about where our money has come from. All fans with this kind of ownership should.

our money came from investors. these investors got their money in legitimate ways. they own all kinds of companies not just oil companies. they also own shares in some british companies, like sainsbury's .. they recently sold a 7% stake in Barclays, makeing £ 2 billion in profit.

 

[Q8-Blue]

Garbage absolute garbage.......Sheikh Mansour probably doesn't even have a say in how his country is run nor does he have a say in politics. Not all Sheikhs are politicians some of the most successful ones can be fringe Royal Family members with good business acumen aka AlWaleed bin Talaal in Saudi.

Plus how about we ask if the people in the UAE hate their government last time I heard the Emiratis didn't exactly protest in the streets calling for regime change.

He's deputy prime minister - which makes him one of the most senior cabinet members in the UAE.

I can't comment in much detail on the politics of UAE as I'm not an expert either, but it is a country where almost 90% of the population aren't Emiratis, and therefore have few political rights, where other political parties aren't tolerated, and where there are numerous laws restricting freedom of political expression.

Titles in our part of the world are thrown about lightly, power is probably concentrated to the President of the UAE and other Sheikhs of the various Emirates. 90% of the population are expats as the UAE has a relatively small population. There aren't any countries that I know off that give foreign citizens political power in a foreign nation. The citizens of the UAE are relatively well off and live in a welfare state so they really don't complain.

I would say the main motive for Sh. Mansour in buying Man City was to strengthen his countries economy and tourism through branding and recognition which is what Qatar is doing in buying PSG and putting their name in various football shirts. I wouldn't call the Sh. Mansour as someone who is deliberately buying Man City to cover nefarious human rights abuses in the UAE.

 

[bluenova]

does anyone really care, half the world electronics come from china, who have terrible records, do we stop buying, erm no, same goes for clothes food etc, most places in the developing word have shocking human rights records, do we stop eating or clothing ourselves, erm no.
look at our human rights many decades ago, there was no difference.
if you had an iphone made in china for £500 or a iphone made in usa for a grand, which iphone would you buy, exactly and so would 90% of ppl buy from china.

what we consider bad human rights, was exactly how we used to be many moons ago.

in time all these places will evolve.

I understand where you're coming from, although I think it's more complex - and it's not necessarily a case that we're more advanced than some of these countries.

We can't worry about everything all the time. After all - there are kids dying every minute all over the world. If we were standing next to them, and given the choice between watching some child die and keeping a season ticket, every person on this board would give up the ticket. However, these things aren't happening in front of us, and the guys being tortured by the UAE (and in other countries with our own government's complicity) are far enough removed for us to be able to ignore it. If we worried about every bad thing happening we'd never get on with our lives at all - so we put up barriers and try not to worry about the things that we can't easily change. However it doesn't mean we should totally ignore them - or that journalists shouldn't try to bring the more serious issues to our attention.