By Vivian Yee and David D. Kirkpatrick BEIRUT, Lebanon — Few world leaders are known to write poetry. Fewer still offer it up for public consumption. And almost none record their marital breakups in verse on their personal websites. Then there is the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, who has been publishing his romantic anguish...

Princess Haya’s reported move to Germany raises the very serious question that Ireland’s former President Mary Robinson may have been unscrupulously used as a pawn. Seven months ago I said I was disturbed in this column when Mrs Robinson had lunch with Sheikha Latifa, Haya’s step-daughter, in the United Arab Emirates. Photographs were released on...

EMIRATI Princess Sheikha Latifa has not been seen in public after reportedly attempting to escape from Dubai earlier this year. Her daring bid for freedom is the subject of a BBC documentary Escape from Dubai: The Mystery of a Missing Princess. Who is Princess Latifa and who is her father? Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed al-Maktoum is...