An Air Berlin jet carrying 249 passengers burst a tyre as it made a dramatic emergency landing on a Thai resort island after experiencing engine trouble, the director of Phuket airport said Friday.

The Airbus A330 flight from Phuket to Abu Dhabi got into trouble nearly an hour after take off late Thursday and was forced to return to the tourist island, slamming onto the runway as it landed.

Abu Dhabi has signed a long-term contract with the world's biggest producer Guinea for the supply of bauxite ore for the United Arab Emirates aluminium industry, state media reported on Saturday.

The deal between Abu Dhabi investment fund Mubadala and Guinean firm Compagnie des Bauxites de Guinee will give the UAE "a strategic resource" for its aluminium industry and will help CBG to further increase its bauxite production, the official WAM news agency reported.

Participants in the 10th edition of the International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition (Abu Dhabi 2012) are preparing to promote their innovations and creativity at the event that will be launched in September.

The Exhibition is labeled on the agenda of competent international events as a popular, quality family event, and as an artistic, heritage, environmental and cultural occasion that assimilates the economic aspect where major deals are concluded and large contracts and sales are sealed.

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority believes the world economy offers opportunities for it and other patient investors, despite an uncertain outlook, the government-run fund's managing director said in a report released Monday.

ADIA's 2011 annual review shed little new light on the operations of the world's largest sovereign wealth fund. But the comments from Managing Director Hamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan suggest the tight-lipped fund remains guardedly optimistic about a recovery in economic growth.

An Abu Dhabi court sentenced to death two drug dealers who shot and wounded undercover police officers during an arrest operation in Bani Yas, local media reported on Tuesday.

In February, the state news agency WAM had reported that the pair -- a 26-year-old Emirati and a 19-year-old Yemeni -- shot and wounded two police officers in Bani Yas, west of Abu Dhabi city.

The United Arab Emirates will expel around 1,000 Lebanese expats living in the country as President Michel Suleiman is scheduled to head to the gulf state on Wednesday.

Some of the Lebanese expats, who were expelled during the past few weeks, were forced to sign a document claiming that they support Hizbullah or that they are carrying out “illegal security acts,” al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Tuesday.

U.S. pop icon Madonna hit the stage running at Abu Dhabi's Yas Island stadium on Sunday in her first ever concert in the Gulf, days after launching a world tour in Israel.

An estimated 25,000 fans cheered and screamed as the Material Girl finally appeared on stage more than two hours late, wearing a skin-tight black outfit from her "Girl Gone Wild" album.

France concluded on Wednesday two weeks of war games with the United Arab Emirates, which officials from both sides insisted were not related to regional tensions involving Iran.

The exercises, held every four years, came after a simmering row over ownership of three Gulf islands contested by the Emirates and Iran, and the United States' deployment of cutting-edge F-22 fighter jets to the UAE.

Suspected drug dealers have shot and wounded two undercover police officers during an arrest operation in Bani Yas, state news agency WAM reported Tuesday.

"A first lieutenant and his colleague, a staff sergeant, came under fire in Bani Yas from drug dealers as the police officers tried to arrest them" Monday evening in the town, west of Abu Dhabi city, WAM reported.

Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways on Thursday posted a net profit of $14 million for 2011, exceeding its goal of breaking even for the first time ever, a statement said.

The national carrier of the United Arab Emirates said its revenues were up 36 percent in 2011 to $4.1 billion, with net profit touching $14 million.