UAE hires US firm close to Bannon for anti-Qatar campaign

A company with “close ties” with Steve Bannon, ex-chief strategist ofDonald Trump, was hired by the UAE to launch a social media campaignagainst Qatar, US website McClatchy has reported.Quoting McClatchy, Al Jazeera News said that a $330,000 contract waspaid by the UAE to the firm in order to launch a social media campaignthat included calling for the boycott of Qatar.The hired firm is SCL Social Limited and is part of the same group as Cambridge Analytica.Cambridge Analytica is the firm that Donald Trump hired during hispresidential campaign to reach voters with “hyper-targeted onlinemessaging”, the website said.Bannon, who remains one of Trump’s closest advisers, has long had an interest in the Gulf region.He has huddled with UAE officials behind closed doors, visited thecountry as recently as last month and pushed for a group of MiddleEastern nations, including the UAE, in their bitter dispute with Qatar.On Monday, Bannon spoke at a day-long conference in Washington organisedby the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank and paid for bymultiple donors, entitled ‘Countering Violent Extremism: Qatar, Iran,and the Muslim Brotherhood’.“The speech follows Bannon’s September meeting in the UAE with its crownprince, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan. The two weren’t strangers:Bannon, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and ousted National SecurityAdviser Michael Flynn met with crown prince at Trump Tower during thepresidential transition in December. That meeting triggered controversy,as the UAE hadn’t notified the outgoing Obama administration about thevisit as is customary,” McClatchy said.The UAE also helped broker a meeting in January between a Bannon friend,Blackwater founder Erik Prince, and a Russian close to PresidentVladimir Putin to try to establish a back-channel line of communicationto Moscow for Trump just days before Trump’s inauguration, according tothe Washington Post; Prince met with the Russian in the Seychelleislands off East Africa.According to McClatchy, Prince lives in the UAE and had a multimilliondollar contract with that government to assemble a mercenary securityforce there. His firm also does security work in Africa, much of it forChinese interests.But Bannon has encouraged Prince to move back to the US and run foroffice, and in recent weeks, Prince has begun to publicly consider aprimary challenge to Wyoming GOP Senator John Barrasso.The UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt cut off all ties with Qatar inJune, supposedly in response to its alleged support of terrorism andties to Iran, and mounted a blockade against the nation.Qatar hosts Al Udeid, the largest American military base in the Middle East, home to nearly 10,000 troops.“The US has a pretty substantial presence across the Middle East, but AlUdeid is the most important,” said Mara Karlin, who worked at theDefense Department during the prior two administrations and is now aprofessor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.“Another firm, the Harbour Group was paid more than $2.5mn by the UAEfor work between October 2016 and March 2017, according to the mostrecent filing available, and signed a contract with the Royal Embassy ofSaudi Arabia 11 days before the blockade was announced paying the firm$80,000 per month. Harbour, which has represented the UAE for 15 years,declined to comment.“SCL Social Limited, which shares the same ownership and leadership asCambridge Analytica, recently disclosed a $330,000 contract with theNational Media Council of UAE for “a wide range of services specific to aglobal media campaign,” according to Foreign Agents of Registration Actrecords. It received $166,500 on September 20.“Bannon, who served as White House chief strategist until August,retained an ownership stake in Cambridge Analytica worth $1mn to $5mnwhen he entered the White House, according to his financial disclosurereport. He had served as vice president and secretary for CambridgeAnalytica and received a monthly consulting fee for his work beforeresigning his position there in August 2016.“Bannon was supposed to sell the stake while he served in theadministration as part of his ethics agreement and obtained acertificate of divestiture in April 2017 to defer taxes on the potentialsale. However, there’s no indication that he actually sold the stake,as he never filed the transaction report that’s required after thepurchase or sale of any asset.“Another of the company’s owners is Robert Mercer, the billionaire whospent millions of dollars helping Trump get elected. Cambridge Analyticadidn’t respond to a request for comment,” Mclatchy added.The House Intelligence Committee, which is looking into whether Trumpassociates worked with Russia to meddle in the 2016 election, hasquestioned Cambridge Analytica, according to the Dailybeast.