A British IT worker says he faces a possible six-month term in a Dubai prison for sticking his middle finger up at another driver during a road row.

Jamil Ahmed Mukadam, 23, made the rude gesture as he made his way to the airport in a hire car after a holiday in the Gulf state with his wife in February.

When he returned to the oil-rich emirate on September 10 he was arrested at immigration control and initially held in a police cell with criminals including rapists and murderers, he told the Sun.

He told the paper he was later released on bail to a hotel but had his passport confiscated to stop him leaving the country, and is close to running out of money.

Mr Mukadam, from Leicester, told the Sun that he had made the rude gesture to a driver who tailgated him and started flashing his lights, and "thought nothing more of it".

He told the newspaper: "I was driving to the airport with my wife and this guy was up behind me flashing his lights.

"I pulled over and they were screaming at me. I stuck my finger up and drove off."

He added: "It's the kind of thing that happens in England all the time. You don't go to jail for it.