Bertie Ahern praised Dubai's economy five days before the state announced a debt of billions

Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern's reputation as an economic expert has suffered another blow after he praised Dubai's "extraordinary" economic success five days before it announced it might not be able to pay back billions of euro in debt.

Speaking at last weekend's World Economic Forum event in Dubai, Ahern congratulated the emirate's government for "doing better than anybody else" at a time of global economic turmoil. On Friday, Dubai's flagship government-owned holding company announced that it would be delaying repayment of a €40bn debt, plunging the world's stock markets into turmoil and prompting fears of another global financial crisis.

YouTube footage of Ahern speaking at the event shows him saying: "Dubai more than anywhere has strategic thinking, vision, planning out key objectives, making them a reality and becoming a central hub of this whole region.

"It has done that to extraordinary success. And in tough­er economic times Dubai is doing better than anybody else, so my congratulations to them."

He also said, "Dubai's capacity to have an influence in the world and to bring so many positive developments to the world over the last number of decades makes it instrumental." The downturn in Dubai's fortunes has echoes of the equally sudden collapse in Ireland's economy in the last years of Ahern's leadership, although the former taoiseach has strongly defended himself against criticism.

He once famously told people who moan about the economy to kill themselves.

Speaking last weekend, before Dubai left world markets on a knife-edge, Ahern thanked the state's "extremely helpful and co-operative" government for organising the "think-tank" event. He stressed the benefits of bringing together people, like himself, who have experience in conflict resolution.