Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the Prime Minister and Vice-President of the United Arab Emirates took the opportunity whilst attending the IPC Powerlifting World Championships to announce details of a grant of Dh6 million (£985,000/$1.6milliion/€1.2 million) for disability sport in the nation.

It is hoped that the financial support will help boost athletes’ participation in local, regional and international disability sports events.

Which was good news for their participation in the IWAS World Junior Games 2014 as UAE are now hoping to send around 30 athletes to the event at Stoke Mandeville in August. Of course this is not a new relationship between UAE and IWAS. In January IWAS announced the opening of our first regional office which is located in Sharjah, UAE and is hosted by the Althiqah Sports Club. And of course in 2011 both the World Games and World Junior Games were hosted in the UAE, Dubai and Sharjah respectively.

The UAE first competed in the 1992 Paralympic Games in Barcelona but has since grown within para sport immensely, developing in different sports including a team of athletes which are now actively taking part within Wheelchair Fencing.