Bilateral relations between United Arab Emirates and Switzerland
Bilateral relations between United Arab Emirates and Switzerland
Relations between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Switzerland are primarily of an economic nature. Thanks to regular high-level visits as well as bilateral agreements and memorandums of understanding (MoU), bilateral cooperation has also been developed in other areas.
Recently, UAE implemented free trade agreement. This agreement signed in June 2009 together with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and the other member states of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA*) .This agreement entered into force on 1 July 2014 and was fully implemented on 1 July 2015. On the political front, in 2012 a MoU was signed on regular bilateral consultations. The latest consultations took place in May 2015 in Abu Dhabi.
However, there are a series of previous agreements governed the bilateral relations, such as:
Double taxation agreement (2011)
MoU on waiving the visa requirement for the holders of diplomatic or service passports (2010)
Investment protection agreement (1998)
Air traffic agreement (1999)
Switzerland is one of the most important partners in terms of Foreign trade. In 2014, Switzerland is within the top 10 partners in regards to the volume of non-oil foregn trade with 11.06 billion USD. Switzerland has 4% Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) stock in UAE is among the top 10 countries.
* The EFTA States are consisted of the following countries: Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland
Source: http://www.economy.gov.ae
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