Some believe after Joe Biden took office as the U.S. President, the honey moon between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia during Donald Trump’s presidency has come to an end and for this reason Saudis now have decided to change their hostile policy against Iran and to get closer to this powerful country.

Some also believe that Saudis have been forced to change their tone because of Iran’s power and influence in the region and in the world as well as recent supremacy of Houthis in war with the coalition forces. And some also believe that the Saudis have changed their tactic and they want to show a peaceful nature despite years of atrocities against Yemenis and their anti-Iran measures.

Anyway and for any reason, the Islamic Republic of Iran welcomes the new approach of the Saudis provided that it is a real change in attitude.

Reacting to Bin Salman’s interview and remarks, Iran Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said Iran welcomes the recent “change in Saudi Arabia’s tone” towards the Islamic Republic, adding that the “important” regional players can start revisiting their relations.

“With the help of constructive viewpoints and a dialog-based approach, the important regional and Muslim world countries can put their differences behind and enter a fresh chapter of interaction and cooperation towards realization of regional peace, stability, and development,” Saeed Khatibzadeh said on Thursday night.

Earlier, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had told the Saudi-owned al-Arabiya TV that the kingdom viewed Iran as a neighboring country and aspired to have good relations with it.

“At the end of the day, Iran is a neighboring country. All we ask for is to have a good and distinguished relationship with Iran,” he had said.

Khatibzadeh recalled how the Islamic Republic itself has been originating proposals aimed at sewing up existing rifts among regional countries, most importantly the Hormuz Peace Initiative (HOPE). Devised by President Hassan Rouhani, the proposal seeks to establish a mechanism implemented by regional countries to ensure regional security.

With such proposals, “the Islamic Republic has been pioneering the course of regional amity and cooperation and welcomes the change in Saudi Arabia’s tone,” the spokesman said.

He expressed hope that the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan inaugurates convergence among members of the regional Muslim society and rid the region of the scourge of warfare, displacement, and insecurity.

During the interview, however, Bin Salman added a touch of Saudi Arabia’s former discourse to his remarks, claiming Riyadh “has a problem with Tehran’s negative behavior, its nuclear program, and its support for militias.”

The Islamic Republic has changelessly spurned any claims aimed at branding it with regional interference or tarnishing its nuclear activities.

Iranians have always called for friendly ties with their neighboring states especially the Muslim states and have been urging Saudi Arabia to stop meddling in the regional countries’ affairs and put an end to the years-long Riyadh-led war on its impoverished southern neighbor Yemen.

Now Iran is a regional power that everybody has admitted and Saudi Arabia is also has to accept it and should stop taking offensive approach against the country and Saudis are better to cooperate with Iran and other regional Muslim states against foreign forces’ presence in the region because foreigners just think of their own benefits and they look to Muslim countries in the region as milking cow to take advantage of them.

Now time is ripe for unity among the Muslim countries against presence of foreigners in their countries and region, and the Islamic Republic of Iran welcomes stretching of friendship hand by any country provided that it is a true one and is not a dramatic gesture for deceiving because Iran is now  a smart and powerful country which monitors any move of friends and foes wisely.

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Bin Salman, known as MBS, will not wait for his father King Salman to die because his father’s presence gives legitimacy to the son, and he wants to use the summit in November as the stage for his accession to the throne, sources briefed about the plans told the Middle East Eye.

Instead, MBS will force his father, who suffers from dementia but is in otherwise good health, to abdicate, the sources said.

This will finish the job started when MBS ousted his elder cousin Prince Mohammed bin Nayef from the position of the crown prince, the sources said.

“He wants to be sure while his father is there, he becomes the king,” one source said. Over the weekend pictures were released of King Salman greeting ambassadors, to disprove rumors sparked by the purge that the king had died. Sources at the King Faisal Hospital dedicated to the care of members of the Royal Family also dispelled those rumors.

Before his arrest on Friday, Prince Ahmed, the king’s younger full brother, was given one last chance, after years of public opposition, to come aboard the MBS project, and he refused, the sources said.

“There was pressure on Ahmed to give his full support to MBS. He met with the king, and Salman and others in the court used polite words to encourage him to back his son,” a second source said.

“Ahmed made it clear he would not support this project. He did not give his word. Ahmed told the king he himself was not keen to become king but would look to others to come forward.”

Meanwhile, more details emerged about the circumstances of Ahmed’s arrest.

According to the sources, Ahmed was not planning a coup before his arrest on Friday morning, as was claimed in one briefing given to Reuters, primarily because the prince had no power to make such a move.

“Prince Ahmed would have openly objected to his nephew’s accession, as a member of the Allegiance Council, if the king dies and the question of accession to the throne comes formally before it,” the source said.

“He would have clearly said no. But there was no attempted coup.”

The Allegiance Council, or Beya, is the body which still nominally has to approve MBS’s accession to the throne.

The source said Ahmed had just returned from a falconry hunting trip abroad and had given a reception for his close circle on Thursday night.

Ahmed was passed a message that the king wanted to see him on Friday morning. This was about another arrested prince, Faisal bin Abdelrahman, whose case Ahmed had raised with Salman some weeks ago.

On Friday morning, Prince Ahmed went to the royal palace with his security detail. He was arrested the moment he entered the king’s compound.

“He did not see the king. It was total betrayal,” the source said. According to him, a second member of the Allegiance Council was also arrested in the purge.

Asked why this purge was launched now, the sources cited external and internal reasons.

They said MBS was becoming concerned about the possibility that Donald Trump would not secure a second term of office as US president.

All the presidential candidates remaining in the Democratic race were declared critics of the crown prince and had openly condemned him for ordering the murder of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul in 2018.

Trump and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have consistently refused to hold the crown prince accountable for the murder of Khashoggi and blocked calls for a criminal investigation by the FBI or the UN.

In his last interview on the subject published in June last year, Trump said the Khashoggi murder “really didn’t come up” in the discussions he held with MBS.

“They spend $400bn to $450bn over a period of time, all money, all jobs, buying equipment,” Trump said.

“And by the way, if they don’t do business with us, you know what they do? They’ll do business with the Russians or with the Chinese.”

Secondly, the sources claimed that the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed, known as MBZ, who has mentored MBS and introduced him to the Trump clan before he became president, was also in on the scheme.

Hamed al Mazroui, a well-known blogger with links to MBZ, whose tweets were among the first to break the news of the purge in the Ritz Carlton in November 2017 and the 2017 start to the siege of Qatar by Saudi Arabia and others, tweeted two words in Arabic before the latest arrests were widely known. They translate as “Checkmate”.

“MbZ is instrumental in each move his protege makes. The more mistakes MbS makes and the greater the instability he causes, the greater the leverage bin Zayed has over the affairs of Saudi,” the source said.

Internally, MBS’s reforms are not going well.

The two latest hitches to his reform plan are the rapid fall in the price of oil, to below the level at which the state budget needs for its income, and his increasing unpopularity in the Muslim world, months before the annual Hajj is due to start.

Held back by curbs on oil output negotiated by Opec, Saudi’s economy expanded just 0.3 percent in 2019, down from 2.4 percent a year earlier and short of the government’s forecast of 0.4 percent.

MBS’s economic woes deepened on Sunday, when the Saudi stock market dived by 8.3 percent, the lowest closing since November 2017, when he launched the first round of purges.

Shares in Saudi Aramco dropped below their IPO price of 32 riyals ($8.50) for the first time, losing 9.1 percent to 30 riyals.

Controversy has also stalked MBS’s decision to effectively close the borders of the kingdom to most visitors and all Umrah pilgrims, because of the coronavirus epidemic.

All these factors, sources say, convinced MBS to strike now against the last remaining hurdles in the way of his accession to the throne.

“This purge is different from the first one in 2017 . Then, Mbs was at the height of his popularity as a young and bold reformer. He sold the purge as an anti-corruption campaign, and it was popular even with journalists like Khashoggi.  This purge comes after a series of scandals. Its as if MBS is trying to evade one scandal by moving on to an even bigger one.” another high placed Saudi critic said.

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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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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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Last week Jamal Khashoggi’s fiancee, Hatice Cengiz called on clarification of her fiancee’s murder after a long silence while she was aware of the direct and undeniable role of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the murder and mutilation of her fiancee body.

Cengiz mentioned recently that Saudi officials have been involved in the killing of Khashoggi and his murder has been a political crime.

This issue has once again attracted the attention of the participants in G20 summit, and bin Salman was questioned and even blamed for Khashoggi’s murder in many of his official and informal meetings with the heads of G20.

Saudi officials, however, believe that the UAE security service and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan were the director of this event aimed to retaliate against some unilateral measures taken by the Saudi regime in the region (regardless of the interests of the Emiratis).

However, the Saudis also did not keep silent about the action of the Emirati and took revenge!

According to some known sources, there has recently been a meeting between al-Saud’s intelligence service members and wife of the ruler of the Emirate of Dubai Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum in Dubai which was is in fact Saudi Arabia’s security counterattack to the United Arab Emirates.

There is, of course, no report on the content of this meeting, but the general confirmation of this issue has provoked anger on Emirati officials.

Reportedly, Haya bint Hussein, wife of the ruler of the Emirate of Dubai has fled to Germany some weeks ago and applied for asylum.

Accordingly, Emirati officials are now worried about Saudi abusive use of Haya bint Hussein’s secret information, especially since she sought political asylum upon her arrival in Germany, and demanded divorce from bin Rashid absently.

In this regard, bin Zayed has personally asked the German authorities to return Haya bint Hussein to the Emirates, but this demand has been rejected by German officials.

In such circumstances, the issuance of permission for Saudi security officials to meet with Dubai’s spouse has led to the simultaneous embarrassment form the rulers of Berlin and Riyadh.

It should be noted that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan who over the past four years have had the highest share in supporting the Takfiri terrorists and undermining the security and stability of the Southwest region of Asia, have recently faced great controversy over Yemen crisis.

Those who have joint projects such as full support for ISIL, Yemen crisis, terrorist operations in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan and Afghanistan, the removal of Qatar from the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council’s political equations, support of Khalifa Haftar in Libya, and other decommissioning in North Africa, complete harmony with the Zionist regime to normalize relations with the Arabs and ‘Deal of the Century’ and a strategic alliance with Donald Trump against the interests of the Muslim world and the axis of resistance, now are trying to shift the responsibility of the failure in Yemen to each other.

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– 91 percent of people want the Al Saud family to keep ruling the kingdom and 9 percent want a regime change.

– Saudi citizens think that Ahmed bin Abdulaziz, Muhammad bin Nayef, Mohammad Bin Salman, and Mutaib bin Abdullah are the most popular politicians based on their personality, former positions and their status in the tribe.

– Saudi Arabia’s international image has been badly tarnished over the last year, especially after the brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Moreover, Mohammad Bin Salman’s development plans inside the framework of the 2030 Agenda turned out as a failure. Now, 53 percent of Saudi citizens believe if Ahmed bin Abdulaziz comes to power, he might be able to repair Saudi’s destroyed image.

– 30 percent of Saudi citizens think Muhammad bin Nayef is a good replacement for Mohammad Bin Salman because they believe Nayef did a good job as the First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior of Saudi Arabia.

– Saudi citizens think that Muhammad bin Nayef is also a good candidate for becoming Saudi’s next king because he can restore some of the powers of the Al ash-Sheikh and revive some of the long-lost religious and cultural traditions.

– Most Saudis think that Mohammad Bin Salman has done a poor job over the last few years and only 14 percent of people think he is a good candidate for becoming the next king. The wrong policies of Mohammad Bin Salman have exasperated some of the issues such as poverty, unemployment, and inflation and have led to widespread corruption and immorality in society; many social, political and religious activists were executed over his term. His policies have also made Saudi Arabia fail in many of its key confrontations in the Middle East, such as the Yemen War.

– Finally, 3 percent of Saudis want Mutaib bin Abdullah to gain power. He is the third son of King Abdullah and served as Saudi’s Minister of the National Guard.

While it’s not clear how much these factors will matter since Saudi Arabia doesn’t have a democracy it seems that once MBS takes power he may lack the stability he has promised.

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In the video clip, Zarif was heard saying that the ones behind efforts to change the establishment in Iran are Israeli PM Netanyahu, US National Security Advisor John Bolton, Saudi crown prince Bin Salman, and officials of the United Arab Emirates.

“They have all shown an interest in dragging the US into a conflict [with Iran],” Zarif said. “I do not believe President Trump wants to do that. I believe President Trump ran on a campaign promise of not bringing the US into another war.”

Zarif went on to add, however, that Trump’s policy of maximum pressure to bring Iran to its knees is “doomed to failure.”

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The famously infamous ‘butcher of Riyadh’, who has faced blistering criticism over Khashoggi’s cold-blooded murder and the ongoing genocide in Yemen, is doling out billions of petrodollars to keep his friends and foes in good humor.

His first stop on the three-nation tour was understandably Pakistan, the cash-strapped South Asian ally of Riyadh. With a massive entourage and billions of dollars, MBS was given red carpet welcome in Islamabad and driven from the airport by the prime minister himself.

While the Pakistan government left no stone unturned to appease its guest, even conferring him the highest civilian award of the country, people in the streets protested against the visit of the ‘murderer’ and denounced the government for putting the country’s sovereignty at stake in lieu of petrodollars.

News reports said almost 750 hotels rooms and luxury cars had been hooked for the royal visit and about 3,500 pigeons were bought for release to mark the prince’s maiden visit to Pakistan.

During his two-day visit to Pakistan, MBS signed $20 billion in investment deals, according to news reports. The biggest project is $10 billion refinery and oil complex in Gwadar, a port city in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province close to Iran border.

According to analysts, the project will give Saudi firm foothold in the restive Balochistan province of Pakistan and it could be used as a launch pad for efforts to destabilize neighboring Iran.

“The investments would further enhance Saudi influence in Pakistan as well as the kingdom’s foothold in Baluchistan,” James Dorsey of Singapore-based S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies wrote in a blog last week.

Dorsey said the $10 billion project in Gwadar “would strengthen the kingdom’s hold in the strategic province that both MBS and Donald Trump’s hardline national security adviser John Bolton see as a potential launching pad for efforts to destabilise Iran.”

Analysts Tehran Times spoke to agreed that the Saudi investments in Pakistan, and in particular Baluchistan, is part of a grand scheme devised by Riyadh and Washington to aid and abet proxy attacks against Iran through Baloch insurgent groups and also to prevent the strategic port of Chabahar to become a powerful maritime hub.

Just last week, a major attack took place in Iran’s Sistan-Baluchistan province, leading to death of at least 27 members of IRGC. Top military commanders in Iran linked the attack to Saudi sponsorship of insurgent groups in Pakistan.

These developments have expectedly raised concerns in Pakistan’s intelligentsia circles as it is being seen counter-productive to Pakistan’s interests.

“Pakistan, please stop housing these militants and stop using this precious nation to fight other’s wars,” tweeted Ayesha Siddiqa, Pakistan-based military scientist and author, “We will live without MBS’s billions but don’t throw people in this fire.”

In August last year, soon after the new government took over in Islamabad, Siddiqa told Tehran Times that one of the biggest challenges for the government was implementation of laws to stop financing of terror organizations.

“The LeT or Jaish e Muhammad or Ahle Sunnat wal Jamaat (ASWJ) all are going about their business. There is money coming from somewhere. These activities are observed by the world. This has to stop,” she said, without mentioning Saudi Arabia.

Taha Siddiqui, a senior Pakistani journalist, in an Al Jazeera column said the Saudis were “using aid packages and investment promises to buy the economically embattled Pakistani government’s loyalty and convince it to turn a blind eye to their destructive actions within Pakistan’s borders.”

Meanwhile, during his two-day stay in Pakistan, hashtags like #MurdererBinSalman and #MBSNotWelcome were trending on Twitter and Facebook.

His next stop on the three-nation South Asia tour was India, but he didn’t take the flight directly from Islamabad, rather went through his home turf to make it appear like a ‘standalone visit’.

In India, although government officials accorded him warm reception, the story on the streets of New Delhi and other major cities was starkly different.

In the heart of New Delhi, thousands of people, holding placards and chanting slogans, gathered to say ‘no’ to the ‘murderer of Yemeni children’. The pictures were shared widely on the social media.

According to reports, MBS signed deals worth around $40 billion with the Indian government. But his growing proximity with Pakistan understandably didn’t go well with many Indian observers.

“Saudi crown prince visits Pakistan, throws a $20 billion lifeline, praises Pak for its effort to counter terrorism. Then comes to India to denounce terror attack in Pulwama. And we politely call it diplomacy!” tweeted M K Venu, a senior journalist and co-founder of The Wire.

Indrani Bagchi, a senior journalist with Times of India, said MBS had “screwed India over” even before arriving in New Delhi.

“Modi government should give up the idea that the KSA relationship has been turned. The Saudi-Pakistan joint statement is a slap in the face for India,” she tweeted.

Congress leader Manish Tewari, echoing her words, asked why the Indian government was welcoming Saudi crown prince and rolling out a red carpet for him.

“Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, if you read the joint statement with Pakistan, has essentially supported the non-listing of the Jaish and Masood Azhar as UN entities. So under those circumstances, why are we even receiving him in India when he is so openly batting for Pakistan,” he asked.

Pertinently, a joint statement by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan on Monday said there was a need to avoid “politicization of the UN listing regime” — in reference to India’s efforts to list Masood Azhar as a “global terrorist”.

Masood Azhar is the leader of Jaish e Mohammad (JeM) that carried out the deadly attack in Indian-controlled Kashmir last week, which sparked unprecedented diplomatic retaliation from India.

Minhaz Merchant, a noted author and commentator, said he was “personally repelled by MBS.” “I’ve respectfully declined invitation to attend a banquet in his honour at Rashtrapati Bhavan tomorrow,” he tweeted.

A Twitter user Mohd Atif Siddiqui said #MBSinindia was a “disgrace to India”, calling him “a ruthless monarch creating genocide in Yemen”.

The final stop on his three-nation tour will be China. But, from what we observed in Pakistan and India, the foreign policy of Saudi Arabia driven by petrodollars does not seem workable. And the intelligent minds in both the countries have already disapproved his wooing tactics.

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Republican Senator Bob Corker said he expected the measure to pass the Senate, noting that its co-sponsors include Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Reuters reported.

If it passes the House of Representatives, it would go to the White House for Trump to sign or veto.

Corker said he hoped to introduce the legislation as soon as Tuesday, but a spokeswoman said later it would not be before Wednesday. “Hopefully, we’ll have a very, very strong vote on a resolution condemning the crown prince,” Corker said.

Aides to Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether the House planned to vote on the measure if it passed the Senate.

Separately, a House aide said that CIA Director Gina Haspel would hold a classified briefing on the Khashoggi case for House leaders and the heads of national security committees on Wednesday.

Two Democratic senators, Ed Markey and Jeff Merkley, said they sent a letter on Tuesday asking Energy Secretary Rick Perry to brief Congress on any talks he had with Saudi Arabia on a civilian nuclear agreement on a recent trip to the kingdom.

Department of Energy officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Joint congressional resolutions must be signed by the president and have the force of law. The resolution’s content has not been released, so it was not clear whether the joint resolution would prompt any specific punishment against the crown prince or the kingdom beyond a statement of condemnation.

Corker said it was largely similar to a resolution introduced last week by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham and other Republicans and Democrats that condemned Khashoggi’s death and said the Senate “has a high level of confidence” that the Saudi crown prince was complicit in his murder.

Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October.

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Bouteflika’s office said in a statement that the ailing 81-year-old was confined to bed with an “acute flu” as the Saudi prince arrived for his two-day trip to Algeria, AP reported.

The crown prince attended the Group of 20 summit and has been visiting Arab nations over the past week on his first international tour since Saudi agents killed Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate on Oct. 2.

US intelligence assessments and experts have said the crown prince, who controls all levers of power in Saudi Arabia, ordered or at least knew about the killing.

The crown prince was met with protests in Tunisia, but has been received by government officials in the region.

Algerian Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia greeted the prince on the tarmac late Sunday and held talks with him on Monday in Bouteflika’s absence.

Meanwhile, Algeria’s largest Islamic party, the Movement of Society for Peace (MSP), criticized Ouyahia for welcoming bin Salman, saying, “Those who roll out the red carpet for bin Salman do not care about Algeria.”

In another development on Monday, sources told the Al Jazeera media network that bin Salman’s visit to Jordan had been postponed by at least two days, without elaborating on the reason behind the delay.

The crown prince had been expected to arrive in Amman on Monday.

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