According to The Times, the Emiratis are not imposing a blanket ban, and privately funded students will be able to enrol at U.K. universities. Representational image.
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The United Arab Emirates (UAE), which provides its high-achieving students generous grants to study abroad, has been restricting admissions to British universities over fears that campuses are being radicalised by an extremist Islamist group, a UK media report said on Friday (January 9, 2026).
The Times referenced officials with knowledge of the move to claim that federal funding was being limited for UAE citizens hoping to study in the U.K. due to the feared influence of the Muslim Brotherhood, among other issues.
The group is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the UAE, which has also campaigned for European nations to ban it over extremist activities.
“It’s a way of threatening young students to behave, saying in essence, whatever you do, don’t join the Muslim Brotherhood if you’re in the U.K.,” the newspaper quoted a Middle East expert as saying.
“They (the UAE) complain to the UK about the Muslim Brotherhood to cause a diplomatic stink until they get what they want. It’s often an internal thing. I don’t believe our universities are infested with the Muslim Brotherhood, it’s all about positioning,” the expert stated.
According to The Times, the Emiratis are not imposing a blanket ban, and privately funded students will be able to enrol at U.K. universities. However, state funding will be directed towards university degrees in other overseas destinations.
The number of UAE students enrolled at U.K. universities doubled to 8,500 between 2017 and 2024, a rise likely to be impacted by this decision.
Programmes managed through its Ministry of Education and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the UAE’s study grants are designed to cover tuition, living stipends, travel and health insurance for top-performing students pursuing degrees in priority fields.
The UAE, along with other countries in the region, has cracked down on the Muslim Brotherhood, believing that the Islamist group poses a serious threat to its relatively secular and socially liberal system, the newspaper reports.
In 2014, the then-Prime Minister David Cameron led Conservative government launched an inquiry into the group which concluded that while the group’s beliefs were opposed to British values, there wasn’t enough evidence to ban the movement.
In France, President Emannuel Macron ordered officials to draw up proposals to tackle the group’s influence in May last year.
Published – January 09, 2026 08:39 pm IST
