EOCN Targeted Financial Sanctions: A Sanctions Screening Guide for UAE Brokers

Every deadline below comes from Cabinet Decision No. 74 of 2020 or the EOCN’s Guidance on Targeted Financial Sanctions (last amended March 2026). Screening is one part of a broker’s AML duties; the full set is in our guide to AML for real estate agents in the UAE.

What are targeted financial sanctions?

Targeted financial sanctions (TFS) are defined in Federal Decree-Law No. 10 of 2025 (art. 1) as the freezing of funds and the prohibition of making them available, directly or indirectly, to any person or organisation designated by the UAE Cabinet on its terrorist lists or by the UN Security Council. In practice that gives two duties:

1. Freeze the funds and other assets of a designated person, without delay and without telling them first.
2. Do not provide funds, assets or services to that person, directly or indirectly.

“Funds or other assets” include real estate. For a broker, the EOCN guidance says, freezing can mean stopping the facilitation of a deal or blocking the transfer of ownership of a property. A freeze has no time limit and stays until the person is delisted or the EOCN cancels it. The sanctions also reach entities that listed persons own or control and anyone acting on their behalf.

Who is the EOCN?

The EOCN is the Executive Office for Control and Non-Proliferation, the federal body responsible for implementing targeted financial sanctions in the UAE (FDL 10/2025, art. 1). It was previously called the Executive Office of the Committee for Goods Subject to Import and Export Control, which is why older documents still use the website address `uaeiec.gov.ae`. The current site is `eocn.gov.ae`, and the TFS team answers at tfs@eocn.gov.ae.

Three documents set your obligations:

MoET’s Supplemental Guidance for Real Estate Agents & Brokers (March 2026) says that the operational and procedural TFS requirements for brokers are governed by the EOCN guidelines.

How to register for the EOCN notification system

Cabinet Decision 74/2020 (art. 21(1)) requires you to register on the EOCN website to receive notices of new listings, changes and delistings. The EOCN calls this the Notification Alert System (NAS). Once you subscribe, every update to the UAE and UN lists arrives by email.

The steps in the EOCN’s Simple Guide to Subscribe:

1. Open the Targeted Financial Sanctions page on the EOCN website.
2. Click the “Sanctions List and Subscription” icon on the right of the page, then “Subscribe to Sanction Lists”.
3. Choose individual or company, enter the name in Arabic and in English, pick the type of business and give the email address that should receive alerts.
4. Click subscribe. A pop-up confirms the subscription.
5. A confirmation email arrives at the registered address. Keep it in your compliance file.

If the form rejects your entry, remove numbers and symbols from the entity name in both languages (EOCN FAQ), or write to tfs@eocn.gov.ae. Use a mailbox your Compliance Officer reads every day, because the freeze deadline described below runs from the designation.

NAS only sends you alerts. Your sanctions reports go through goAML, so you need both registrations; the steps are in goAML registration in the UAE. The EOCN also asks you to check UN press releases regularly or daily, depending on your business model.

Which sanctions lists must you screen?

Cabinet Decision 74/2020 covers two lists, and the EOCN guidance calls them together the “Sanctions Lists”.

The UAE Local Terrorist List is on the EOCN’s TFS page in PDF and Excel; the UN list is on the Security Council website.

A match on a foreign list such as OFAC or the EU’s does not oblige you to freeze under UAE law, and the CNMR and PNMR reports are only for the UAE and UN lists. You can still screen foreign lists as part of your risk-based approach, for example when buyers or funds come from the US, the EU or the UK. MoET’s real estate guidance asks brokers to make sure no customer, transaction or property is linked to people, entities or jurisdictions under financial sanctions or other restrictive measures.

Who and what to screen

Under Cabinet Decision 74/2020 (art. 21(2)) and the EOCN guidance, a broker screens:

• existing customers, buyers and sellers;
• potential customers, before you take them on or start a deal;
• former customers, going back five years;
• every party to a deal, including the counterparty your customer is buying from or selling to;
• the beneficial owners of company customers;
• directors, agents and anyone acting for a customer, including holders of a power of attorney.

Screen on the key identifiers first: for an individual the name, date of birth, nationality, ID or passport number and last known address; for a company the name, trade licence number and registered address. Check aliases (“also known as” names) only after the key identifiers.

Two ownership rules matter on property deals. A company more than 50% owned by a designated person, or controlled by one, is itself subject to freezing. A person acting for a designated person is too, but only where documents prove it, such as a power of attorney or an authorised signatory arrangement. Suspicion alone is not enough to freeze.

The four screening results

Keep every screening result, including false positives, for at least five years (EOCN guidance).

What to do on a confirmed match

The Confirmed Name Match Report (CNMR) was called the Funds Freeze Report (FFR) until the EOCN’s July 2025 update. It goes through goAML to the EOCN and to your supervisor.

An existing customer. Freeze the funds and assets without delay, which means immediately and in any case within 24 hours, and without warning the customer. Stop all services. File the CNMR within five business days of the freeze. Cabinet Decision 74/2020 sets the same limits (arts. 1 and 15(2)).

A prospective customer or a counterparty. Reject the deal, provide nothing, and file a CNMR within five business days of the rejection.

The guidance’s broker example: the prospective seller in a sale is a confirmed match. The broker blocks the transaction immediately, stops all services to the seller and files a CNMR within five business days, attaching the type, value and location of the property with the title deed (for off-plan units, the sale and purchase agreement or similar) and the seller’s ID documents.

The 24 hours run from the designation, so the guidance asks you to screen immediately whenever the lists change. Weekends and public holidays count too: you need a procedure that blocks access to assets that may be frozen, and if your business is closed and customers can’t reach any assets, screening starts from the first minute you reopen.

• Look back five years: file a CNMR on past relationships and deals from the five years before the designation, even if you hold nothing now.
• No tipping off before the freeze: your staff must not tell the customer that a freeze is coming (art. 21(7)). Telling them after the freeze is not tipping off, and the guidance says to point them to the EOCN’s grievance procedure.
• Freezing or refusing services in good faith under the Decision exempts you from claims for damages (art. 23(2)).
• When a person is delisted, lift the freeze immediately unless another authority’s freeze order applies.

What to do on a partial match

The Partial Name Match Report (PNMR) is for matches you can’t confirm or rule out.

An existing customer. You already hold their ID, so if it still doesn’t settle the question, suspend any transaction without delay, stop services and file a PNMR within five business days of the suspension. Keep the suspension until the EOCN replies through goAML. If it confirms the match, freeze and file a CNMR. If it finds a false positive, lift the suspension and record the outcome.

A prospective customer or a counterparty. First ask for their ID documents. If the ID shows a false positive, go ahead and note why. If you don’t get the documents within 10 business days, reject the deal and file a PNMR within five business days of the rejection. If the documents leave the match unclear, suspend and file a PNMR.

PEP screening and adverse media

Cabinet Resolution No. 134 of 2025 defines PEPs as people who hold or have held prominent public functions in the UAE or abroad, from heads of state and senior officials to senior executives of state-owned companies and international organisations. The definition includes their immediate family (spouses, children and their spouses, parents) and known close associates.

A PEP can still buy or sell property through you. For a foreign PEP, CR 134/2025 (art. 16) requires a risk management system to identify PEPs among customers and beneficial owners, senior management approval for the relationship, reasonable measures to establish the source of funds and wealth, and closer ongoing monitoring. For a domestic PEP or someone with a prominent role in an international organisation, take adequate measures to identify them and apply the same extra steps when the relationship is high risk. CR 134/2025 does not refer to an official PEP list, so you identify PEPs through your own checks, for example screening databases and open sources.

Adverse media has no article of its own. MoET’s real estate guidance expects open-source reviews for adverse media, criminal links and PEP links during customer due diligence, and again later where risk indicators justify it. CR 134/2025 (art. 5) lists open sources among enhanced due diligence measures. A PEP link or an adverse media result raises your risk rating and the depth of your checks. CNMR and PNMR reports are only for the two sanctions lists, so if the result makes you suspect a crime, the report is an STR to the FIU.

How often should you re-screen?

Cabinet Decision 74/2020 (art. 21(2)) requires regular screening and immediate screening whenever you are notified of a change to the lists. The EOCN guidance says to screen:

1. immediately after any update to the lists;
2. before taking on a new customer;
3. at periodic KYC reviews, or when the nature or ownership of a customer changes materially;
4. before processing any transaction with a counterparty.

Neither the Decision nor the guidance sets a fixed calendar interval for periodic reviews. CR 134/2025 (art. 8) asks you to keep customer information up to date, with particular attention to high-risk customers. The July 2025 guidance also listed daily screening of customer databases; the March 2026 version dropped that item. You can screen manually if your volumes allow it or use an outside provider, and the EOCN says the responsibility stays with you either way.

Penalties for breaching TFS

• For individuals, violating the instructions of the EOCN or another competent authority on targeted financial sanctions is punishable by imprisonment and a fine of at least AED 20,000, or either penalty (FDL 10/2025, art. 33).
• For the company, when its representatives, directors or agents commit that offence on its behalf, the company faces a fine of AED 200,000 to AED 10,000,000 (art. 27(2)). The person who actually manages the company can also be punished if they knew of the offence and it resulted from a breach of their duties (art. 27(5)).
• As administrative penalties, MoET can impose the measures in art. 17, including fines of AED 10,000 to AED 5,000,000 per violation.

Versions of the EOCN guidance up to July 2025 quoted one to seven years in prison and fines of AED 50,000 to AED 5,000,000. The March 2026 version replaced them with art. 33 of the 2025 law. What changed in that law is in our guide to Federal Decree-Law No. 10 of 2025.

What we can do for you

Some steps stay with you. Your Compliance Officer receives the alerts, applies the freeze and submits reports in goAML. Our AML subscription for real estate brokers covers the rest:

• EOCN and goAML registration, if you aren’t registered yet;
• a Targeted Financial Sanctions procedure in your AML documentation set, covering screening, freezing, and CNMR and PNMR reporting;
• sanctions and PEP screening of up to 100 clients a year, with a risk rating and a call on standard or enhanced due diligence;
• re-screening when the sanctions lists change, and client file reviews every year, or every 6 months for high-risk clients;
• CNMR and PNMR preparation: a match is escalated to you the same business day and the report is ready for your Compliance Officer within one business day (up to 10 reports a year of any type).

The subscription costs AED 12,000 + VAT a year or AED 3,750 + VAT a quarter. See what’s included →

This guide is general information, not legal advice.

What this means for you

Sanctions screening comes down to three things a broker has to have in place: