Doha (Somalia Today) — Billions of dollars’ worth of African gold now pass through Dubai each year, far beyond what many African states record as exports, turning the United Arab Emirates into a central transit point for metal linked to conflict, tax evasion and weak regulation, according to trade data and investigative reports.
A 2019 investigation by Reuters found that large quantities of gold left Africa undeclared and reached the UAE, then moved on to markets in Europe, the United States and Asia. Critics say this system has entrenched a UAE conflict gold hub.
The Emirates has almost no major gold mines of its own. Instead, it relies on African supply, a dense network of refineries and trading houses, and relatively light procedures that have attracted both small dealers and big refiners.
Emirati officials say controls have tightened in recent years. Watchdogs disagree and warn that gold from conflict areas still enters global supply chains through the country’s markets and free zones.
Smuggled gold to Dubai
The scale of the trade is hard to track because much of it moves informally. The 2019 analysis by Reuters estimated that 446 tonnes of gold reached the UAE from 46 African countries in 2016 alone, worth around $15 billion at the time.
In many cases, those exports did not appear in the African states’ own customs data. That gap suggested large-scale smuggling.
More recent research shows the pattern continues. A 2025 report from SwissAid, cited by Reuters, said Ghana lost about $11.4 billion between 2019 and 2023 because artisanal gold bypassed official channels. Much of that metal moved through neighbouring states before ending up in Dubai.
The study found a 229-tonne gap between Ghana’s declared exports and what trading partners reported importing, with the UAE as a primary destination.
Other outlets, including Mining Technology and regional media that summarised the SwissAid findings, highlight the same concern. They point out that a large share of Ghana’s missing gold likely flows into the Emirates.
In Mali and Burkina Faso, authority has weakened after coups and jihadist violence. Officials and analysts describe similar leakages there.
Gold from areas contested by armed groups is sold to local middlemen, moved across porous borders and finally declared in Dubai.
Rights organisations say this trade robs African states of tax revenues, undermines environmental safeguards and gives militias a steady income stream.
Sudan and the RSF
Sudan is the African country most frequently linked to the UAE conflict gold hub. It ranks among the continent’s biggest producers and is the largest Arab gold supplier.
Since the secession of South Sudan in 2011 cut off most oil income, Khartoum has leaned heavily on gold. The government encouraged artisanal mining but did not bring the trade fully under state control.
Investigations by Global Witness show how the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a powerful Sudanese paramilitary group led by Mohamed “Hemedti” Hamdan Dagalo, built a network of front companies.
These firms dominated key mining areas such as Jebel Amer in Darfur and moved profits through banks in Sudan and the UAE.
According to the group, RSF-linked conglomerate Al Junaid created a chain that ran from pits in Darfur to accounts and partners in Dubai.
A related Global Witness investigation into refiners found that Swiss company Valcambi sourced gold from UAE-based Kaloti, which was itself linked to Sudanese “conflict gold”.
The report warned that this metal could ultimately enter the supply chains of major consumer brands.
These financial structures grew even more important after war broke out in Sudan in April 2023 between the RSF and the national army.
UN experts and other monitors describe how bullion leaves RSF-controlled zones by road and air, often via Chad or South Sudan, and then travels on to the UAE.
In return, weapons and supplies move back along the same networks. The UAE denies arming the RSF and says it supports diplomatic efforts to end the fighting.
Pressure for reform
The UAE says it is cleaning up the sector and points to new rules on due diligence, suspicious-transaction reporting and refinery oversight.
In March 2022, however, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) placed the Emirates on its “grey list” of jurisdictions under increased monitoring and cited strategic deficiencies in anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorism financing.
Abu Dhabi then spent two years pushing through legal changes and strengthening supervision. On February 23, 2024, FATF removed the UAE from the grey list after the country completed its action plan.
European regulators followed on June 10, 2025, when the European Union took the UAE off its own money-laundering high-risk list. That move signalled greater confidence in Emirati controls.
Campaigners say legislative progress is only part of the answer. A briefing by the Global Democracy Coalition, which drew on work by groups such as The Sentry, welcomed the reforms but argued that the UAE still has “much to prove” in enforcing rules against laundering and sanctions evasion, given its role as a global commodities hub.
Global Witness has also criticised what it calls limited transparency around the sourcing of some Dubai-based refiners.
Global hunger for gold
The political stakes around conflict-linked bullion keep rising as gold plays a larger role in global finance.
Multiple shocks since 2022, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and heightened tensions between China and the West, have pushed central banks to diversify their reserves.
The World Gold Council’s Central Bank Gold Reserves Survey, summarised by Reuters and analysts at OMFIF, finds that many central banks plan to increase their gold holdings over the next five years and expect global official reserves to keep growing. Some also intend to reduce reliance on the US dollar.
That demand has helped push prices to record highs. The surge makes the trade even more profitable for miners, intermediaries and hubs such as Dubai.
Analysts warn that, without strict traceability from mine to refinery, higher prices could deepen the incentive to smuggle rather than to reform.
For African states, the key question is whether they can capture more value from their own resources while limiting the role of armed groups.
For the UAE, the challenge is to show that a country which became a leading bullion centre in just two decades can stay at the heart of the trade without acting as the main gateway for conflict gold.
