Umm Al Quwain in the context of "Dubai–Sharjah–Ajman metropolitan area"

The General Maritime Treaty of 1820 was initially signed between the rulers of Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah and Great Britain in January 1820, with the nearby island state of Bahrain acceding to the treaty in the following February. Its full title was the "General Treaty for the Cessation of Plunder and Piracy by Land and Sea, Dated February 5, 1820".

The treaty was signed following decades of maritime conflict in the Persian Gulf, with British, French, and Omani flagged ships involved in a series of disputes and actions that were characterized by officials of the British East India Company as acts of piracy on the part of the dominant local maritime force, the Qawasim. It led to the establishment of the British protectorate over the Trucial States, which would last until the independence of the United Arab Emirates on 2 December 1971.

Emiratis (Standard Arabic: الإماراتيون; Gulf Arabic: الإماراتيين) are the citizen population of the United Arab Emirates. Within the UAE itself, their number is approximately 1.15 million.

Formerly known as the Trucial States, the UAE is made up of seven emirates, each of which has a ruling family. Abu Dhabi was home to the Bani Yas tribal confederation; Dubai was settled in 1833 by an offshoot of the Bani Yas, the Al Bu Falasah; Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah are the home to the Al Qasimi or Qawasim; Ajman to the Al Na'im, Umm Al Quwain to the Al Ali and Fujairah to the Sharqiyin.