Jamal Khashoggi Archives - Iran News Daily

Saudi Crown Prince Is Held Responsible for Khashoggi Killing in U.S. Report

reporter 1222 — Sat, 27 Feb 2021 09:04:35 +0000

TEHRAN (Iran News) – Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia approved the assassination of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, according to an intelligence report that the Biden administration released on Friday that offered the world a reminder of the brutal killing.

An elite team of operatives helped carry out the killing, the report said. The team reported directly to Prince Mohammed, who cultivated a climate of fear that made it unlikely for aides to act without his consent, according to the report. It omitted the brutal details of Mr. Khashoggi’s death, including the dismemberment of his body with a bone, saw after Saudi officials lured him to their consulate in Istanbul.

But the Biden administration took no direct action against Prince Mohammed, the de facto ruler of the kingdom, instead of announcing travel and financial sanctions on other Saudis involved in the killing and on members of the elite unit of the Royal Guard who protect the crown prince. The administration concluded it could not risk a full rupture of its relationship with the kingdom, relied on by the United States to help contain Iran, to counter terrorist groups, and to broker peaceful relations with Israel. Cutting off Saudi Arabia could also push its leaders toward China.

Lawmakers of both parties praised the release of the report, but some Democrats, including Representative Adam B. Schiff of California, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, spoke out in dismay that the administration stopped short of more severely punishing Prince Mohammed for the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, a legal permanent resident of Virginia who was critical of the Saudi government in columns he wrote for The Post.

“There are ways to bring about more personal repercussions without completely rupturing the relationship,” Mr. Schiff said in an interview.

Still, he added: “This is an official U.S. government stated that the crown prince of Saudi Arabia has blood on his hands, and that blood belongs to an American resident and journalist. And I think that’s very powerful.”

The 2018 assassination of Mr. Khashoggi and the brutality of his death, detailed in news reports at the time, shocked the world. And it disgusted American officials, including the C.I.A. director at the time, Gina Haspel, according to current and former intelligence officials. Ms. Haspel and the other American officials listened to a recording obtained by Turkish intelligence that not only captured Mr. Khashoggi’s struggle against Saudi agents and his killing, but also the sounds of the saw being used on his body.

The Saudi government issued a blistering response to the report’s release and the penalties, rejecting the document as a “negative, false and unacceptable assessment” about its leaders.

“It is truly unfortunate that this report, with its unjustified and inaccurate conclusions, is issued while the kingdom had clearly denounced this heinous crime,” the statement said. It noted that the kingdom had “taken steps” to prevent a repeat of the killing; it prosecuted eight people in connection with it.

Much of the evidence the C.I.A. used to conclude that Prince Mohammed was culpable in Mr. Khashoggi’s killing remains classified. But the report’s disclosure was the first time that the American intelligence community had made its conclusions public, and the declassified document was a powerful rebuke of the crown prince, a close ally of the Trump administration, whose continued support of him prompted international outrage.

The release of the report signaled that President Biden, unlike his predecessor, would not set aside the killing of Mr. Khashoggi and that his administration intended to try to isolate the crown prince.

“We assess that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey, to capture or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi,” said the report, issued by Mr. Biden’s director of national intelligence, Avril D. Haines.

The decision to rebuke the Saudis without punishing Prince Mohammed directly was the result of a weekslong debate among aides to Mr. Biden, who during the 2020 campaign called Saudi Arabia a “pariah” state with “no redeeming social value. Two years earlier, Mr. Biden called out the Trump administration for its inaction after Mr. Khashoggi’s death, calling it “embarrassing” and “dangerous.”

Mr. Biden’s newly formed national security team advised him that he could not bar the heir to the Saudi crown from entering the United States, nor weigh criminal charges against him, without breaching the relationship with a key Arab ally, according to officials.

They said that a consensus emerged inside the White House that the cost of such a breach, in terms of Saudi cooperation on counterterrorism and in confronting Iran, was simply too high.

For Mr. Biden, the decision was a telling indication that his more cautious instincts had kicked in.

In an interview with Univision on Friday, the president said that he “spoke yesterday with the king, not the prince.” Mr. Biden added that he had “made it clear to him that the rules are changing, and we’re going to be announcing significant changes today and on Monday” to hold the Saudis accountable. “It is outrageous what happened.”

Ultimately, the Biden administration announced penalties against Saudi officials, including a travel ban and freezing of assets of the kingdom’s former intelligence chief and sanctions against members of a paramilitary unit that took part in the assassination.

The State Department also announced visa restrictions against 76 Saudis accused of suppressing or harming journalists, activists, and dissidents, and more will eventually be applied to others around the world as the administration expands enforcement of a new “Khashoggi ban,” Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken said.

“The relationship with Saudi Arabia is bigger than any one individual,” Mr. Blinken said Friday at a news conference at the department. “What we’ve done by the actions that we’ve taken is really not to rupture the relationship, but to recalibrate it to be more in line with our interests and our values.”

Dennis Ross, a former Middle East negotiator and foreign policy aide in administrations of both parties, applauded Mr. Biden for “trying to thread the needle,” calling the matter “a classic example of where you have to balance your values and your interests.”

“We are now doing things that show a clear difference from Trump on democracy and human rights,” Mr. Ross added in an interview.

The four-page intelligence report contained few previously undisclosed major facts and reiterated the C.I.A.’s conclusion from 2018 that Prince Mohammed ordered the killing of Mr. Khashoggi. It made its case based on smaller pieces of evidence and the C.I.A.’s understanding of the crown prince’s control of the kingdom, which intelligence officials have long said led them to a high-confidence conclusion of his culpability.

Prince Mohammed viewed Mr. Khashoggi as a threat and “broadly supported using violent measures if necessary to silence him,” the intelligence report concluded. American intelligence agencies learned that Saudi officials had planned an unspecified operation against Mr. Khashoggi, but the report said the United States has not learned when Saudi officials decided to harm him.

Members of the hit team flew to Turkey on Oct. 2, 2018, after Saudi officials lured Mr. Khashoggi, who was seeking paperwork to marry his Turkish fiancée, into the consulate in Istanbul.

While the team arrived in Istanbul prepared to kill Mr. Khashoggi, American intelligence agencies were not confident that was their only authorized option.

The spy agencies could not rule out that Prince Mohammed might have preferred to capture Mr. Khashoggi, an American intelligence official said, adding that the C.I.A. and other agencies have high confidence in their judgment that Prince Mohammed was responsible for an order to either capture or kill Mr. Khashoggi. His body was never found.

According to the report, Prince Mohammed “fostered an environment” where his aides feared that any failure to follow his orders could result in their arrest. “This suggests that the aides were unlikely to question Mohammed bin Salman’s orders or undertake sensitive actions without his consent,” the report said.

The report listed 21 others involved in the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, including members of the hit team.

The operatives worked for the Saudi Center for Studies and Media Affairs, at the time led by Saud al-Qahtani, a close adviser of Prince Mohammed’s. Mr. al-Qahtani’s official job was the media czar for the Royal Court, and he was once in charge of a campaign to use social media to attack Saudi dissidents online. The report noted that Mr. al-Qahtani had said publicly that he did not make decisions without the crown prince’s approval.

The report said that seven members of Prince Mohammed’s elite protective detail, called the Rapid Intervention Force, or R.I.F., were part of the 15-man team that killed Mr. Khashoggi. The unit has carried out a campaign of kidnapping, surveillance, detention, and torture to crush opposition to Prince Mohammed.

“Members of the R.I.F. would not have participated in the operation against Khashoggi without Muhammad bin Salman’s approval,” the declassified report said.

From the moment Mr. Khashoggi’s death was discovered, Saudi officials sought to deflect blame from the crown prince. The Saudi government imprisoned eight people in connection with Mr. Khashoggi’s death, trying them largely secretively. Though five were originally sentenced to death, after one of Mr. Khashoggi’s sons said he and his siblings had forgiven the men who killed their father, a Saudi court reduced the sentences to prison terms.

Mr. Schiff said he met with White House officials on Friday to press for “more personal repercussions” on the crown prince.

“I don’t think the president should be meeting with him. I don’t think the president should be talking with him,” Mr. Schiff said. “I think the administration should explore ways to go after assets that he controls.”

Ahead of the report’s release, Mr. Biden spoke to King Salman of Saudi Arabia. And officials have said Mr. Biden will speak only with the king, his counterpart as head of state, though others in the administration might speak directly with the crown prince.

Representative Tom Malinowski, Democrat of New Jersey, who was the assistant secretary of state for human rights in the Obama administration, said that a “visa ban for M.B.S. should be mandatory” under existing law “if the secretary of state has credible information that he committed a gross human rights abuse, which the secretary just told us he has.”

Mr. Blinken, Mr. Malinowski said, had the power to waive the visa ban, but only with a report to Congress laying out a justification.

In the waning days of Mr. Trump’s presidency, the outgoing administration approved two major sales of precision-guided bombs to the Saudis totaling more than $750 million. Soon after Mr. Biden took office, his administration suspended those sales but did not cancel them, State Department officials said. The sales could still go through, and other military deals, including for maintenance of Saudi Arabia’s fleet of F-15 attack jets and other support for the kingdom’s military, were unaffected by the suspension.

The intelligence report was written a year ago after Congress, which had been briefed on the underlying findings, passed a law mandating intelligence agencies’ conclusions be declassified and released.

Ms. Haines, in an interview with NPR, acknowledged that the conclusions would not be surprising but insisted that the intelligence agencies had a responsibility “to provide what we see and make sure that it is as clear as possible.”

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Fiancée of Khashoggi Rejects His Family’s Attempt to Pardon Killers

reporter 1222 — Sat, 23 May 2020 11:28:28 +0000

Fiancée of Khashoggi Rejects His Family’s Attempt to Pardon Killers

The fiancée of Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, vowed to fight for justice after his son said the family “forgives” his killers, opening the way for a full pardon.

Salah Khashoggi, the journalist’s son, posted the statement on his Twitter feed this morning, as Muslims prepare to celebrate the end of the holy month of Ramadan.

“In this blessed night of the blessed month we remember God’s saying: If a person forgives and makes reconciliation, his reward is due from Allah.

In reaction to the statement, Hatice Cengiz took to Twitter saying Jamal Khashoggi had become “an international symbol bigger than any of us, admired and loved.”

She further said “Jamal was killed inside his country’s consulate while getting the docs to complete our marriage. The killers came from Saudi with premeditation to lure, ambush (and) kill him.”

Cengiz further noted the heinous murder does not have a statue of limitations, adding that she will not stop until justice is served.

Khashoggi, a columnist for The Washington Post who had become a critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was killed and his body dismembered by a Saudi hit squad after being lured into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018.

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Wahhabism Condescends to Shiism

reporter 1222 — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 23:06:16 +0000

Wahhabism Condescends to Shiism

In these Coronavirus-hit days and in lives of all humanity regardless of what he is doing has caused emergence of great plague and it has almost overshadowed and changed all political, social and economic equations, some coming reports from Saudi Arabia show that Sunni youths of this country in a climate filed with belief and love to religion are converting from Wahhabism to Shiism one after the other.

IRAN NEWS POLITICAL DESK

Although this issue is tried to be kept secret from the media through some adopted measures or it is suppressed by resorting to coercion but it is revealed between bits and pieces of the news and reports and right finally finds its way.

Some video clips from some famous Sunni clerics, who actually feel hearty that Wahhabism like Bahaism is man-made and has been created by the British, have gone viral where they are moving to introduce Shiism and its legitimacy among Islamic sects, and question after question strikes the minds of the Sunni youths about the behavior of Daesh forces and their followers who used to obey Ibn Taymiyyah, and all these questions are unanswered. Everywhere it is talked about enchanting elegance and accuracy of Imam Zaman (A)’s thoughts.

Due to blessing of pro-Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) household Muslims’ maturity in countries like Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran and Yemen, it is talked about resistance and bravery and all this approach is deep-rooted in transparency of Hadis Nabavi (Prophetic Hadith) that does not separate the Holy Quran from Atrat (Prophet’s Household).

Apart from stimulant topics in the thought and faith climate, the number of anti-stimulant climate against Wahhabism’s thought is not few. For example one can point to recent behavior of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman with his relatives. The way Saudis butchered and assassinated Jamal Khashoggi is another example that one can find out the nature of father and son’s ruling over Saudis and one can easily find what factors cause hatred among Saudi youths towards the hypocrisy of the hand-raised of Wahhabism to rise.

Recently Asharq Al-Awsat daily, owned by Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, in an article and in confrontation with the content of the book “Howler of Riyadh” pointed to some conflicts between King Salman and his son and has tried to introduce out of all Saudi Family these father and son to the Muslim community. The article in highlighting important points of the lives of these two princesses has not left any smallest dot in order that one can believe Saudi King is a human being.

Apart from the disrupted foundations in the Saudi Family’s morality, they have also been politically source of deviation and authoritarianism. The tough social condition and a strict religious climate dominating Saudi Arabia, and consequently the rule of Wahhabism, which used to deny any interaction with other cultures and even anathematize them, had made Saudi society an isolated and backward one.

The first diplomatic relation of Saudi Arabia was restored with Egypt and during the ruling of King Farouk where sons of King Bin Abdulaziz got acquainted with some political, social and cultural concepts. But this relation did not last too long and after Gamal Abdel Nasser took power in Egypt, the tie between Egypt and Saudi Arabia was deteriorated. But at the same time that Saudi rulers considered Egypt as their main rivals, they monitoring all Egyptian poets, writers, intellectuals, and artists and their works.

Gradually Saudi rulers realized that they can employ the culture and media to serve the kingdom. And it was a beginning for Saudi Family’s attention to culture, art and media so they turned to read Egyptian books and listen to songs of some famous Egyptian singers or watch some Egyptian movies, and a player was taken to Abdulaziz’s free of spirituality Palace in order that they can watch Egyptian movies.

According to Prince Talal bin Abdulaziz, during watching the films where Egyptian actresses had no hijab (Islamic dressing), his aunts always expressed their dissatisfactions.

Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman was one of the Saudi Family who found out immediately the significance of culture and media and learned that culture and media is the best means to promote himself. So he immediately bought Saudi Printing and Publication Institute. He then bought the license of International Arab-language and London-based Asharq al-Awsat daily and it is a beginning for Bin Salman’s activities in the media.

Either politically or culturally, the book “Howler of Riyadh” tries to recount dark sides of lives of Bin Abdulaziz the King of Saudi Arabia and his son Crown Prince Bin Salman. From ties with Egypt to his subservience to Zionists in Israel and his subservience towards U.S. President Donald Trump, all and all indicate this point that Saudi Family have been the real factor and motivation for young and well-intentioned Saudi youths to turn towards Imam Zama’s thought.

Muslim world under transparent guidelines of Holy Quran and with support of Alawi instructions is moving in direction of re-appearance and what has been mentioned in this article is the smallest part from what is happening in the deep foundations which have tendency towards the world free of sin and cruelty.

By: Hamid Reza Naghashian

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Zarif hits back at S Arabia over normal country remarks

reporter 1222 — Fri, 24 Jan 2020 14:46:35 +0000

Zarif hits back at S Arabia over normal country remarks

According To Iran News, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Saudi Arabia’s direct involvement in Yemen’s humanitarian crisis and the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi makes the country far from what one would call ‘normal’.

“‘Normal’ countries don’t operate abattoirs disguised as consulates,” FM Zarif wrote in a tweet on Friday, in reference to the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

“‘Normal’ countries don’t attack their neighbors, cause a humanitarian crisis, and refuse to talk,” Zarif added, referring to the Saudi-led aggression in Yemen, which has claimed more than 100,000 lives over the past four and a half years.

“Nonetheless, WE don’t set preconditions for dialog,” the Iranian diplomat stressed.

Zarif’s tweet was in reaction to the recent remarks by Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir, who told CNBC that Iran has to act like a ‘normal country’ before Saudi Arabia would be willing to sit down and have a dialogue with them.

The Iranian foreign minister had said in another tweet in Arabic on Thursday that “Iran remains open to dialogue with its neighbors, and we declare our readiness to participate in any complementary work that is in the interest of the region, and we welcome any step that restores hope to its people and brings them stability and prosperity.”

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Khashoggi’s Murder Case Under Spotlight

reporter 1222 — Sun, 06 Oct 2019 22:22:45 +0000

Khashoggi’s Murder Case Under Spotlight

A year has passed since Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist, was murdered at the Saudi Arabian Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey. Recently Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has said he takes “full responsibility” for the murder of Khashoggi – but denies allegations that he ordered the killing.

IRAN NEWS POLITICAL DESK

Bin Salman’s confessions were published while media outlets on last Sunday reported the murder of Major General Abdul Aziz al-Faghm, the long-time personal bodyguard of Saudi Arabia’s King Salman. These two reports led to different assumptions in the social media and media outlets which all cast doubts on murder of al-Faghm.

Arabi 21 news website in a report pointed to the police statement which said al-Faghm had a verbal exchange with Mamdouh bin Meshaal Al Ali, a man described as his friend, who then retrieved a firearm from outside and opened fire. The news website claimed despite what is said in Riyadh, Mamdouh has not been an ordinary citizen. It claimed Mamdouh was former member of Saudi Shoura Council and probably one of Saudi intelligence service officers.

It seems Bin Salman decided to at first to remove the link between him and Khashoggi hit team and then he has accepted the responsibility of Khashoggi’s murder in order to pave the way for trial of the hit team. So by this move, Bin Salman will be put an end to the Khashoggi’s murder case without being pointed as main culprit.

American newspaper New York Times also reported that last Saturday and concurrent with the murder of Al-Faghm, Riyadh had asked intelligence services of some regional states for providing it with information about some Saudi nationals. The report claimed that Bin Salman personally had called for collecting information. Netizens say that the killer of al-Faghm is the son of Dr. Mashaal Al Ali, former member of Saudi Shoura Council, and from Shammar tribe and his ancestors have been once rulers of Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, Saad al-Faqih told Khaleej Online that the operation which led to the murder of General al-Faghm was at the behest of Prince Bin Salman; especially at the time of murder, al-Faghm was present in the Royal Palace and Bin Salman along the said murderer Mamdouh bin Meshaal Al Ali were also in the palace.

The mysterious murder of King Salman’s personal bodyguard once again revived the Khashoggi’s murder case in the world because at first, it was announced that one of the friends of Al-Faghm had murdered him but it is now reported that the murder is linked to Bin Salman.

English newspaper the Times is famous for reporting exclusive news and reports from Saudi Arabia. On last Sunday, the daily in a report said there were some assumptions that link al-Faghm’s murder to Khashoggi’s murder case.

Riyadh has claimed that al-Faghm has been killed by one of his friends after a dispute in his own house. Riyadh also claims that murderer has been killed during confrontation with security forces. The Times by reviewing the official announcements of the Saudis wrote, “Al-Faghm, 47, had been widely seen as the king’s most trusted personal protection officer. His death immediately led to speculation of palace intrigue, with claims that he had recently been dismissed from the king’s service and may have had information pertinent to the murder of Mr Khashoggi.”

Exactly one year ago, Khashoggi for had gone to Saudi Arabia’s Consulate in Istanbul to obtain papers he needed to marry his Turkish fiancée but a hit team murdered and dismembered him and destroyed his corpse.

All news and reports indicate that the nightmare of Khashoggi’s still haunts Bin Salman and has not let him breathe a sigh of relief, and international journalists’ community should work together for an international campaign to take Bin Salman to the International Court of Justice and to put him on trial as a anti-human rights criminal.

By: Hamid Reza Naghashian

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Legal petition made to investigate MBS over Khashoggi murder

reporter 1222 — Wed, 02 Oct 2019 06:06:31 +0000

Tehran (Iran News) – A law firm has filed a petition at the International Criminal Court (ICC) to have Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) investigated for alleged “crimes against humanity”, including the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Khashoggi, 59, was killed a year ago by a team of Saudi agents in the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul and his dismembered body has not been found.

Saudi Arabia has consistently denied that MBS ordered the killing, but a UN investigator has said there was “credible evidence” of the crown prince’s liability that warrants further investigation while the CIA has reportedly concluded that the killing was probably ordered by the prince.

In a petition filed to the ICC’s chief prosecutor in July and made public on Wednesday, the anniversary of Khashoggi’s killing, the US-based law firm Fein & Delvalle requested that the prosecutor petition the UN Security Council to refer the crown prince’s alleged crimes to the ICC.

“Mohammed Bin Salman, through command or superior responsibility, is guilty of murder, torture, rape, extortion, illegal detentions, wrongful prosecution and the death penalty, i.e., crimes against humanity as defined in Article 7 of the Rome Statute,” the filing argues.

“The victims have been selected because of their opposition to the Crown Prince’s merciless tyranny,” it adds.

The petition was filed on behalf of an anonymous human rights organisation, whose identity has been redacted in the filing.

It was not clear whether the Hague-based court would respond to the petition, as it only has jurisdiction over crimes committed on the territory of its member states. Neither Saudi Arabia nor Turkey is a member of the court.

Khashoggi was an established and respected journalist who at the time of his murder was a resident of the United States and a columnist for the Washington Post newspaper. In a number of his columns for the Post, he was critical of MBS’s domestic and international policies, including the Saudi-led coalition’s war in Yemen.

In the weeks after his murder, the Saudi government denied that he had been killed in the consulate, insisting he had left soon after he arrived. But after Turkish officials shared information about the murder with domestic and international news media, Riyadh changed its narrative, saying that he was killed by a team of “rogue” Saudi agents.

Under international pressure, the Saudi prosecutor opened an investigation into the murder and 11 suspects have been put on trial in the kingdom, with the attorney general seeking the death penalty for five of the accused.

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Khashoggi killing; Saudi crown prince denies ordering

reporter 1222 — Mon, 30 Sep 2019 10:00:39 +0000

Tehran (Iran news) – Crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, denied in an interview broadcast on Sunday that he ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi operatives nearly a year ago but said he ultimately bears “full responsibility” for what happened because he is the country’s leader.

Speaking to the US network CBS on its 60 Minutes programme, MBS said: “Absolutely not,” when asked if he ordered Khashoggi killing. Iran news quotes the interview by ILNA.

But he said he took full responsibility, “since it was committed by individuals working for the Saudi government”.

“This was a mistake. And I must take all actions to avoid such a thing in the future,” MBS said of the killing, which he called “heinous”.

Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was last seen at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2 last year, where he was collecting documentation before his wedding. His body was dismembered and removed from the building, according to reports, and his remains have not been found.

MBS’s comments echo those made in a trailer to a PBS documentary due to air this week in which he said: “I get all the responsibility because it happened under my watch”.

Speaking last week after the release of the trailer, Khashoggi’s fiancee Hatice Cengiz described the prince’s comments as a “pure political manoeuvre”.

“By saying that everything happened under his watch, he’s sending the world a message that he’s more influential than the king of Saudi Arabia, and is the real head of the country,” Cengiz said.

‘No exception’

The CIA and some Western governments have said they believe MBS ordered Khashoggi’s killing, but Saudi officials have repeatedly said he had no role.

After initial denials of the murder, the Saudis blamed it on rogue operatives. The public prosecutor said the then-deputy intelligence chief ordered the repatriation of Khashoggi, a royal insider who became an outspoken critic, but the lead negotiator ordered him killed after discussions for his return failed.

Asked how the Khashoggi killing could have happened without him knowing about it, MBS told 60 Minutes: “Some think that I should know what three million people working for the Saudi government do daily? It’s impossible that the three million would send their daily reports to the leader or the second-highest person in the Saudi government.”

He insisted that “the investigations are being carried out, and once charges are proven against someone, regardless of their rank, it will be taken to court, no exception made.”

Khalil Jahshan, executive director of the Arab Center in Washington, DC, told Al Jazeera that the interview was a “good exercise in public relations for Saudi Arabia”, but raised more questions than it answered.

“There are legal issues here,” he said. “Who ordered the killing? He admits that some Saudi citizens – they are officials within his government – perpetrated what he called ‘this heinous crime’ – but who gave the order? if it weren’t him, who else?”

UN rapporteur Agnes Callamard – who investigated Khashoggi killing and called for the crown prince and other senior Saudi officials to be investigated – has dismissed Saudi Arabia’s secretive trial of 11 suspects as a sham. Only a few hearings have been held so far.

Callamard says more efforts should be made to isolate Riyadh diplomatically.

She has urged the CIA to declassify its files on the killing, and for the FBI to open a criminal investigation. Meanwhile, she urged the G20 group of rich countries to move their November 2020 meeting, which is scheduled to take place in Riyadh.

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Khashoggi’s Murder ‘Happened under My Watch,’ Says Saudi Crown Prince

reporter 1222 — Thu, 26 Sep 2019 08:51:41 +0000

Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s de facto ruler, has not spoken publicly about the killing inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The CIA and some Western governments have said he ordered it, but Saudi officials say he had no role.

The death sparked a global uproar, tarnishing the crown prince’s image and imperiling ambitious plans to diversify the economy of the world’s top oil exporter and open up cloistered Saudi society. He has not since visited the United States or Europe.

“It happened under my watch. I get all the responsibility because it happened under my watch,” he told PBS’ Martin Smith, according to a preview of a documentary, “The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia,” set to air on Oct. 1, ahead of the one-year anniversary of Khashoggi’s death.

After initial denials, the official Saudi narrative blamed the murder on rogue operatives. The public prosecutor said the then-deputy intelligence chief ordered the repatriation of Khashoggi, a royal insider who became an outspoken critic, but the lead negotiator ordered him killed after discussions for his return failed.

Saud al-Qahtani, a former top royal adviser whom Reuters reported gave orders over Skype to the killers, briefed the hit team on Khashoggi’s activities before the operation, the prosecutor said.

Asked how the killing could happen without him knowing about it, Smith quotes Prince Mohammed as saying: “We have 20 million people. We have 3 million government employees.”

Smith asked whether the killers could have taken private government jets, to which the crown prince responded, “I have officials, ministers to follow things, and they’re responsible. They have the authority to do that.” Smith describes the December exchange, which apparently took place off-camera, in the preview of the documentary.

Eleven Saudi suspects have been put on trial in secretive proceedings but only a few hearings have been held. A UN report has called for Prince Mohammed and other senior Saudi officials to be investigated.

Khashoggi was last seen at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2, where he was to receive papers ahead of his wedding. His body was dismembered and removed from the building, and his remains have not been found.

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Desperate Bin Salman planning to down Turkey

reporter 1222 — Wed, 07 Aug 2019 09:50:59 +0000

Although Salman is now the king of Saudi Arabia but it can be said “Mohammed bin Salman” is the main ruler of the country given his performance over the past few years.Trying to reach modernity he has overlooked many of traditional Saudi principles and traditions.

Saudi prince has been involved in a range of acts from attacking Yemen, plotting against Qatar, engaging in the failed 2016 coup in Turkey, normalizing ties with Zionist regime to hostility towards Iran.

All these developments have caused Saudi Arabia to get caught in bad conditions, significant portion of the international news in the last week have been about the changes to bin Salman’s policies to end the Yemeni war and exit from the quagmire, as well as trying to get close to Iran.

According to Israeli DEBKAfile, the UAE and Saudi Arabia have quietly embarked on talks with Tehran.

In a report by Middle East Eye (MME) on Tuesday 6 August, there are some documents that show Saudi Arabia has drawn up a plan to take Turkey down.

According to the report, it had received documents from a UAE delegation that underscored Saudi Arabia’s direct action to implement a strategic plan aimed at restricting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Turkey’s regional influence.

The intelligence report is one of a monthly series written by the Emirates Policy Centre, a think tank with close links to the Emirati government and security services. According to the report, Mohammed bin Salman took the decision to confront Turkey following the assassination of Khashoggi by a team of Saudi agents in their country’s Istanbul consulate.

Riyadh had concluded that Erdogan failed in his attempt to politicize and internationalize the case and now is the time to mount the fight back, the report says.

Following the assassination of Khashoggi by a team of Saudi agents in their country’s Istanbul consulate, the relations between Riyadh and Ankara have been highly tense. But Tensions between Saudi Arabia and Turkey have increased since Ankara supported Qatar during 2017 Qatar diplomatic crisis, as well as turned to Iranian side diplomatically.

The aim of the Bin Salman’s plan is to use “all possible tools to pressure Erdogan’s government, weaken him, and keep him busy with domestic issues in the hope that he will be brought down by the opposition, or occupy him with confronting crisis after crisis, and push him to slip up and make mistakes which the media would surely pick up on,” the report added.

According to MME: “Saudi authorities blocked 80 Turkish trucks transporting textile products and chemicals from entering the kingdom through its Duba port”.

Three hundred containers carrying fruit and vegetables from Turkey had also been held in Jeddah’s port, according to a Turkish official who spoke to MEE on condition of anonymity.

The number of Saudi tourists visiting Turkey decreased 15 percent (from 276,000 to 234,000) in the first six months of 2019, according to official data released by the Turkish tourism ministry.

Saudi Arabia is planning to uproot Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan following his pressure on the Kingdom after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, according to a new report published in EXPRESS.

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Washington Post describes Saudi’s bin Salman as new Saddam Hussein

reporter 1222 — Tue, 09 Jul 2019 08:11:40 +0000

“Once upon a time, there was a brutal and reckless dictator of an oil-rich Arab country who, despite his well-documented excesses, was stroked and supported by the United States and other Western governments,” wrote Jackson Diehl in an article published on Washington Post on Monday.

While Saddam Hussein’s crimes were terrible, there was probably no alternative for holding the line against Iran, so he “concluded that, as long as he kept supplying oil and opposing Iran, he was free to butcher his opponents and bully his neighbors.”

“The bet made on him by the United States and its allies directly led to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, and from there to the “endless wars” in the Middle East that are now almost universally bemoaned by the West’s foreign policy establishment.”

“And yet, 30 years later, those mandarins and the politicians they report to are blindly repeating the mistake. They are saying they abhor the blatant crimes of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, including the murder of Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi and the torture and imprisonment of women seeking greater rights. They see his bombing campaign in Yemen as a war-crime-ridden disaster. Yet, at the summit of the Group of 20 in Osaka, Japan, a week ago, they cheerfully clustered around him. Not just President Trump but also prime ministers and presidents from the big European democracies. And not just them but also the leaders of India, South Korea and Japan, all of whom have received Mohammed bin Salman warmly in the past six months.”

The reason for this warm welcome, the writer adds, is because MBS is allied with US and Israel against Iran.

He then referred to the lonely five-month investigation of Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, into Khashoggi’s murder and dismemberment inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul last October, which called for “a halt to the closed Saudi trial of 11 lower-level operatives blamed for the murder, and for an independent investigation by U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, or the FBI. The report also called for sanctions to be imposed on Mohammed bin Salman and his foreign assets “until and unless evidence is provided and corroborated that he carries no responsibility for this execution.”

“The official silence that has greeted the report has been deafening,” the writer adds.

During a visit to Washington last week, Callamard appeared undeterred. “Many governments have attempted to bury it and say, ‘Let’s move on,’ but that killing is not going to disappear,” she said during an appearance at the Brookings Institution. Trump notwithstanding, she is counting on justice to come from the United States. “I think this is the only place where political accountability is going to work,” she said during a meeting at The Post.

“…as long as Trump is president, Mohammed bin Salman is unlikely to face direct US sanction,” the writer says.

“Like Saddam Hussein before him, Mohammed bin Salman has concluded that he is immune. Women he ordered tortured are still in prison. His planes are still bombing Yemen. And he is taking the first steps toward acquiring nuclear weapons. Because Western governments do not stop him now, they will have to do it later — when the cost is likely to be far higher.”

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