Algeria Severs Diplomatic Ties with UAE Amid Mounting Tensions

By Al Mayadeen English

10 Sep 2026 15:18

Algeria has severed diplomatic relations with the UAE after years of escalating tensions and accusations of Emirati interference in regional and national affairs.

Algeria announced on Thursday that it is severing diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates, marking a dramatic escalation in years of increasingly strained ties between Algiers and Abu Dhabi.

The decision was announced by Algerian state television, which said authorities had concluded that efforts to prevent relations from deteriorating further had been unsuccessful.

"Algeria has decided to cut diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates, following the exhaustion of all means to preserve bilateral relations," state television announced.

Algerian authorities also ordered the UAE ambassador to leave, granting the diplomat 48 hours "to comply with the decision."

The announcement represents the sharpest deterioration yet in relations between the two Arab states, following repeated accusations from senior Algerian officials that Abu Dhabi has interfered in the internal and regional affairs of other countries.

Tebboune repeatedly denounced UAE regional role

Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune has repeatedly voiced concern over the policies pursued by the UAE, at times referring indirectly to Abu Dhabi as a "micro-state" or "statelet" that is contributing to instability across the region.

Relations had become particularly tense by July, when Tebboune delivered one of his strongest public criticisms of the UAE's regional activities.

"Wherever they set foot, blood flows," he said in a televised interview in July, adding that the UAE has had a "very negative impact."

"We want them to stay away, so that blood does not flow in our country," he added.

The remarks reflected mounting Algerian concern over what Algiers considers foreign interference in regional crises and attempts to influence developments affecting Algeria's security environment.

Algiers says efforts to preserve relations exhausted

Despite the growing tensions, Tebboune indicated at the time that Algeria had deliberately refrained from taking the ultimate step of severing relations in an effort to prevent further fragmentation among Arab states.

He said a diplomatic break "would have happened long ago" had Algeria not sought to avoid "deepening divisions" in the Arab world.

Thursday's decision indicates that Algiers now considers those attempts to contain the dispute exhausted.

The Algerian announcement did not immediately specify whether a particular recent incident prompted the rupture or detail what measures beyond the departure of the Emirati ambassador would accompany the termination of diplomatic relations.