When You Watch the Tour de France, Think Sudan War /// UAE State Companies Sponsors Elite Cycling Team to Sportswash Rights Abuses

For those who wonder why they so gladly sponsor various sports:

… while fans watch the race through the French countryside, human rights abuses perpetuated by the United Arab Emirates are unfolding elsewhere, out of public view.

… [UAE's] treatment of migrant workers, who face widespread abuses, and its unjust jailing of political dissidents.

… a growing body of evidence indicates that the UAE provides support to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan. This abusive warring party has carried out atrocities that amount to crimes against humanity.

… [Sudanese] civilians have faced massacres, hunger, and destruction. Hundreds of thousands have died and over 11 million people have been displaced. The RSF also carried out mass killings and mass rapes of people fleeing El Fasher in October of 2025.

The UAE has supported the RSF by providing weapons and by facilitating the travel of foreign fighters to Sudan. In a recent report, Human Rights Watch documented how Colombian private military contractors apparently hired by a UAE-based company transited through UAE military bases before being deployed alongside the RSF in Sudan.