By Gary Grappo

The December 14 Senate votes to end US military aid for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen and to condemn Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for his responsibility in the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi mark a watershed moment in US-Saudi Arabia relations. The actions by the American congressional body are a significant departure not only from the policy of the Trump administration but also from the norm of US-Saudi relations dating back to 1945. Today, the three pillars on which US-Saudi relations sit — the administration, the Congress and American business — are becoming anxiously unstable for the House of Saud and the US administration.

The historic decisions by the Senate were a predictable result of a briefing provided by CIA Director Gina Haspel, during which she effectively fingered the de facto ruler of the kingdom for the horrific murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. Though not provided to all members, the briefing was reportedly so convincing, that of those who did attend, many left the session “outraged” at the Crown Prince’s behaviour.

“There is not a smoking gun, there’s a smoking saw,” declared Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina and otherwise stalwart supporter of President Donald Trump. The senator’s assertion stood in stark contrast to Trump’s unconvincing and capricious excusal, “Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.”

A relationship in turmoil

The vote to cut off aid means that while the Crown Prince’s prosecution of the Yemen War may be safe for now — the House of Representatives did not vote on the measure — it will be in jeopardy when the new Democratic-controlled House convenes next month. That war has been a disaster on many counts, not least of which the high rate of Yemeni casualties — over 10,000 deaths (though likely as much as five times higher) and 14 million facing starvation.

For Saudi Arabia, the war has been an embarrassment. The nation with the world’s third highest defence budget has been unable to defeat a ragtag Houthi rebel army. It begs the question of how much worse their performance would have been without American (and other Western) assistance. Imagine if Riyadh had to deliver on some of the Crown Prince’s bluster against Iran, whose military and paramilitary forces are far more numerous and infinitely more capable than the hapless Houthis. So, the Senate’s action, though toothless for now, taken in conjunction with the ceasefire negotiated in Stockholm, spells good news for a Yemeni population in desperate need after nearly four years of war and deprivation.

The Senate’s unanimous condemnation of Mohammed bin Salman, or MBS, will be more significant for the US-Saudi relationship. Though MBS’ position appears secure for the moment — and all evidence points to his likely ascension to the Saudi throne after his father, King Salman — he will be forever marked by the US Congress for his role in the Khashoggi execution. It is difficult to see how he overcomes such an unprecedented handicap as the leader of a nation previously viewed as one of America’s most important allies. In fact, it would be hard to find the leader of any close American ally in recent history with such a cloud over his head.

This ought to register on the minds of every member of the House of Saud. As important as the relationship is for the US, it is indispensable and fundamental to Riyadh. The folly in Yemen is a perfect example of why the kingdom must maintain its close relations with Washington and, most importantly, the American defensive backstop that comes with it.

Critical to maintaining that relationship has been the congressional support nearly always given to every administration’s Saudi policy starting in 1945 under President Franklin Roosevelt. The Senate’s votes, and those likely to follow when the new Congress takes office next month will mean that fulsome support can no longer be assumed. To be sure, the relationship unquestionably remains in American and Saudi national interests. But the kind of support that the Saudis could previously count on and the usually friendly reception it got on The Hill are no longer certain and, in fact, highly doubtful.

Backed into Royal corner

For the Trump administration, which has placed so much stock on both the president’s and his son-in-law’s personal relationships with the Crown Prince, the Senate actions are especially painful. The president can no longer look to the Republican-controlled Congress to back him up on the kingdom. Donald Trump and Jared Kushner must now dance to a much different tune.

Those personal relations have attracted added scrutiny of late. First, there is the recent New York Times report of the inordinately close relationship between Kushner and Mohammed bin Salman. The relationship is particularly unsettling given Kushner’s lack of diplomatic or military experience and ignorance about the Middle East region generally, and Saudi Arabia specifically. It calls into question who may be using whom.

Then, there is the more recent revelation that Kushner may have dispensed advice to MBS after the latter’s dispatching of Khashoggi. In addition to the potential criminal element in that action, there is also the violation of standard White House and State Department protocol, namely the absence of other officials on the call, not to mention simple common sense. Finally, there comes word that Special Counsel Robert Mueller may be extending his investigation into the Trump campaign to possible illicit involvement of Middle Eastern governments, including Saudi Arabia’s. Are the kingdom and its crown prince becoming a liability for this White House?

Business becomes nervous

The third leg of the US-Saudi relationship has been the attendant support the kingdom typically received from US businesses and banks. But there is apparent and growing disenchantment of international investors with the kingdom, who view it as less than a good bet these days. In fact, businesses saw the writing on the wall considerably sooner than the Senate votes and the Khashoggi affair. After MBS detained hundreds of Saudi Arabia’s exalted business elite in the Ritz Carlton for an extended period and imposed a blockade on fellow Gulf Cooperation Council member Qatar in June 2017, international business questioned the judgment, business acumen and ultimate political intentions of the brash crown prince who had committed to vault Saudi Arabia’s non-oil sector to unprecedented levels.

Today, the platform of the US-Saudi relationship is seriously out of kilter. Two of the three pillars on which it rests — Congressional backing and business support — have been weakened. The third cannot now be considered a certainty in a post-Trump White House. And with the mercurial, impulsive and politically toxic Mohammed bin Salman at the helm, it is difficult to see how the sides can come together to rebalance this vital relationship to serve their mutual interests.

 
(Gary Grappo is a former US ambassador and a distinguished fellow at the Center for Middle East Studies at the Korbel School for International Studies)

(This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the <a href="https://www.fairobserver.com/region/north_america/senate-saudi-arabia-vote-war-yemen-mbs-jamal-khashoggi-gulf-news-16521/">original article</a>)

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

 
&nbsp;

By Gary Grappo The December 14 Senate votes to end US military aid for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen and to condemn Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for his responsibility in the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi mark a watershed moment in US-Saudi Arabia relations.

By Gary Grappo The December 14 Senate votes to end US military aid for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen and to condemn Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for his responsibility in the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi mark a watershed moment in US-Saudi Arabia relations. The actions by the American congressional body are a significant departure not only from the policy of the Trump administration but also from the norm of US-Saudi relations dating back to 1945. Today, the three pillars on which US-Saudi relations sit — the administration, the Congress and American business — are becoming anxiously unstable for the House of Saud and the US administration. The historic decisions by the Senate were a predictable result of a briefing provided by CIA Director Gina Haspel, during which she effectively fingered the de facto ruler of the kingdom for the horrific murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. Though not provided to all members, the briefing was reportedly so convincing, that of those who did attend, many left the session “outraged” at the Crown Prince’s behaviour. “There is not a smoking gun, there’s a smoking saw,” declared Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina and otherwise stalwart supporter of President Donald Trump. The senator’s assertion stood in stark contrast to Trump’s unconvincing and capricious excusal, “Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.” A relationship in turmoil The vote to cut off aid means that while the Crown Prince’s prosecution of the Yemen War may be safe for now — the House of Representatives did not vote on the measure — it will be in jeopardy when the new Democratic-controlled House convenes next month. That war has been a disaster on many counts, not least of which the high rate of Yemeni casualties — over 10,000 deaths (though likely as much as five times higher) and 14 million facing starvation. For Saudi Arabia, the war has been an embarrassment. The nation with the world’s third highest defence budget has been unable to defeat a ragtag Houthi rebel army. It begs the question of how much worse their performance would have been without American (and other Western) assistance. Imagine if Riyadh had to deliver on some of the Crown Prince’s bluster against Iran, whose military and paramilitary forces are far more numerous and infinitely more capable than the hapless Houthis. So, the Senate’s action, though toothless for now, taken in conjunction with the ceasefire negotiated in Stockholm, spells good news for a Yemeni population in desperate need after nearly four years of war and deprivation. The Senate’s unanimous condemnation of Mohammed bin Salman, or MBS, will be more significant for the US-Saudi relationship. Though MBS’ position appears secure for the moment — and all evidence points to his likely ascension to the Saudi throne after his father, King Salman — he will be forever marked by the US Congress for his role in the Khashoggi execution. It is difficult to see how he overcomes such an unprecedented handicap as the leader of a nation previously viewed as one of America’s most important allies. In fact, it would be hard to find the leader of any close American ally in recent history with such a cloud over his head. This ought to register on the minds of every member of the House of Saud. As important as the relationship is for the US, it is indispensable and fundamental to Riyadh. The folly in Yemen is a perfect example of why the kingdom must maintain its close relations with Washington and, most importantly, the American defensive backstop that comes with it. Critical to maintaining that relationship has been the congressional support nearly always given to every administration’s Saudi policy starting in 1945 under President Franklin Roosevelt. The Senate’s votes, and those likely to follow when the new Congress takes office next month will mean that fulsome support can no longer be assumed. To be sure, the relationship unquestionably remains in American and Saudi national interests. But the kind of support that the Saudis could previously count on and the usually friendly reception it got on The Hill are no longer certain and, in fact, highly doubtful. Backed into Royal corner For the Trump administration, which has placed so much stock on both the president’s and his son-in-law’s personal relationships with the Crown Prince, the Senate actions are especially painful. The president can no longer look to the Republican-controlled Congress to back him up on the kingdom. Donald Trump and Jared Kushner must now dance to a much different tune. Those personal relations have attracted added scrutiny of late. First, there is the recent New York Times report of the inordinately close relationship between Kushner and Mohammed bin Salman. The relationship is particularly unsettling given Kushner’s lack of diplomatic or military experience and ignorance about the Middle East region generally, and Saudi Arabia specifically. It calls into question who may be using whom. Then, there is the more recent revelation that Kushner may have dispensed advice to MBS after the latter’s dispatching of Khashoggi. In addition to the potential criminal element in that action, there is also the violation of standard White House and State Department protocol, namely the absence of other officials on the call, not to mention simple common sense. Finally, there comes word that Special Counsel Robert Mueller may be extending his investigation into the Trump campaign to possible illicit involvement of Middle Eastern governments, including Saudi Arabia’s. Are the kingdom and its crown prince becoming a liability for this White House? Business becomes nervous The third leg of the US-Saudi relationship has been the attendant support the kingdom typically received from US businesses and banks. But there is apparent and growing disenchantment of international investors with the kingdom, who view it as less than a good bet these days. In fact, businesses saw the writing on the wall considerably sooner than the Senate votes and the Khashoggi affair. After MBS detained hundreds of Saudi Arabia’s exalted business elite in the Ritz Carlton for an extended period and imposed a blockade on fellow Gulf Cooperation Council member Qatar in June 2017, international business questioned the judgment, business acumen and ultimate political intentions of the brash crown prince who had committed to vault Saudi Arabia’s non-oil sector to unprecedented levels. Today, the platform of the US-Saudi relationship is seriously out of kilter. Two of the three pillars on which it rests — Congressional backing and business support — have been weakened. The third cannot now be considered a certainty in a post-Trump White House. And with the mercurial, impulsive and politically toxic Mohammed bin Salman at the helm, it is difficult to see how the sides can come together to rebalance this vital relationship to serve their mutual interests. (Gary Grappo is a former US ambassador and a distinguished fellow at the Center for Middle East Studies at the Korbel School for International Studies) (This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article) (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

Are Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince becoming a liability for the White House?

With the 2018 World Cup in Russia behind it, the soccer world’s focus shifts to the 2022 tournament in Qatar. Politics and the Gulf’s internecine political and legal battles have already shaped debate about FIFA’s controversial awarding of World Cup hosting rights to Qatar. The battles highlight not only the sport’s dominance in the Middle East by autocratic leaders but also the incestuous relationship between politics and sports that is at the root of multiple scandals that have rocked the sports world for much of this decade and compromised good governance in international sports.

Three men symbolise the importance of soccer to Gulf autocrats who see the sport as a way to project their countries in a positive light on the international stage, harness its popular appeal in their cultural and public diplomacy campaigns, and leverage it as a pillar of their efforts to garner soft power: Qatari emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and his nemeses, United Arab Emirates Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed and Saudi sports czar, Turki al-Sheikh, one of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s closest associates.

To be sure, the tension between Qatar and its Gulf detractors was spilling onto the soccer pitch long before the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt took their opposition to Qatari policies to a new level with the imposition in June 2017 of a diplomatic and economic boycott of Qatar. Since then, debate about the Qatari World Cup has been further politicised with the Gulf crisis driving efforts to deprive Qatar of economic and soft power benefits it derives from its hosting of the tournament, if not of the right to host the mega-sports event.

The UAE-Saudi efforts took on added significance as Qatar and its detractors settled in for the long haul. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt will likely face difficult choices if the Gulf crisis persists when the World Cup, the first such mega-tournament to be held in the Middle East, kicks off in Doha in late 2022.

Difficult choices

The choice would involve potential political risk. It would be between maintaining the boycott that has cut off all air, sea and land links between Qatar and its detractors at the expense of fans in a soccer-crazy part of the world in which little evokes the deep-seated emotions associated with religion and football or effectively breaching the embargo to evade political backlash and ensure that supporters have access to a sports milestone in the region’s history. The starkness of the boycotting states’ dilemma would be magnified if any one of them were to qualify for the Qatar World Cup and would be enhanced if they were to play the host country or, for example, Iran.

The issue of ability to attend is magnified by expectations that the demography of fans attending the World Cup in Qatar may very well be different from that at past tournaments. Qatar is likely to attract a far greater number of fans from the Middle East as well as Africa and Asia. The Asian Football Confederation’s Competition Committee has already urged governments to exempt football teams from travel bans and would almost certainly do the same for fans.

As a result, the UAE-Saudi effort to undermine the Qatar World Cup is about more than seeking to deliver a body blow to Qatar. It is also about avoiding being further tied up into knots in an anti-Qatari campaign that has so far failed to break the Gulf state’s resolve, force it to concede, and garner international support. The campaign is multi-pronged and doesn’t shy away from violating laws as is evident in Saudi bootlegging to deprive beIN, the sports franchise of Qatar’s state-owned Al Jazeera television network, of the fruits of acquired rights to broadcast World Cup tournaments and European competitions at the risk of being penalized and/or taken to court by the likes of FIFA and the English Premier League. Saudi media reports that the government has launched an anti-piracy campaign, confiscating more than 4,000 illegal receivers that hacked beIN failed to put an end to the bootlegging.

Signalling the political importance that men like the crown princes and Sheikh Tamim attribute to sports, a former top UAE security official, Lt. Gen. Dhahi Khalfan, suggested that the only way to resolve the Gulf crisis would be for Qatar to surrender its World Cup hosting rights. "If the World Cup leaves Qatar, Qatar's crisis will be over ... because the crisis is created to get away from it," Khalfan said.

Khalfan spoke at a time that leaked documents from the email account of Yousef Al-Otaiba, the UAE ambassador in Washington and a close associate of the country’s crown prince, revealed a UAE plan to undermine Qatar’s currency by manipulating the value of bonds and derivatives. If successfully executed, the plan would have allowed Qatar’s distractors to argue that the Gulf state’s financial problems called into question its ability to organize the World Cup.

Serving national interests

Al-Sheikh, the chairman of the kingdom’s General Sport Authority, makes no bones about harnessing sports to serve the kingdom’s interests. With a career in security rather than sports, he was unequivocal in his assertion on the eve of Saudi Arabia’s debut in the 2018 World Cup in Russia that he made decisions based on what he deemed “Saudi Arabia’s best interest,” reaffirming the inextricable relationship between sports and politics.

Barely 24 hours before the World Cup’s opening match, Saudi Arabia made good on Al-Sheikh’s assertion that the kingdom’s international sports policy would be driven by former US President George W. Bush’s post 9/11 principle of “you are either with us or against us.”

With Morocco’s bid for the 2026 World Cup in mind, Mr. Al-Sheikh had warned that "to be in the grey area is no longer acceptable to us. There are those who were mistaken in their direction … If you want support, it'll be in Riyadh. What you're doing is a waste of time…," &nbsp;Al-Sheikh said. &nbsp;Al-Sheikh was referring to Morocco’s refusal to join the anti-Qatari campaign. Adopting a Saudi Arabia First approach, Mr. Al-Sheikh noted that the United States “is our biggest and strongest ally.” He recalled that when the World Cup was played in 1994 in nine American cities, the US “was one of our favourites. The fans were numerous, and the Saudi team achieved good results.”

Al-Sheikh was manoeuvring at the same time to ensure that the kingdom has greater say in international soccer governance, including issues such as the fate of the Qatari World Cup and a push to extend international isolation of Iran to the realm of sports. To do so, Saudi Arabia backed a proposal to speed up the expansion of the World Cup to 48 teams from 32, which is scheduled to kick off in 2026, by making it already applicable to the 2022 World Cup. Saudi Arabia hopes that the expansion would significantly complicate Qatari preparations for the event. Implementing the expansion in 2022 would strengthen UAE and Saudi efforts to petition FIFA to force Qatar to agree to co-hosting of the World Cup by other Gulf states, a proposal that was incorporated in the UAE plan to undermine Qatar’s currency.

In an indication of things to come, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) in early 2018 thwarted a UAE-Saudi attempt to get Asian tournament matches that were scheduled to be hosted by Qatar moved to a neutral venue. The AFC warned the two countries that they would be penalized if they failed to play in Doha or host Qatari teams.

Al-Sheikh’s moves were part of a two-pronged Saudi-UAE effort. Global tech investor Softbank, which counts Saudi Arabia and the UAE among its largest investors, is believed to be behind a $25 billion proposal embraced by FIFA president Gianni Infantino to revamp the FIFA Club World Cup and launch of a Global Nations League tournament. If approved, the proposal would give Saudi Arabia a significant voice in global soccer governance.

Complimenting the Saudi FIFA bid is an effort to expand the kingdom’s influence in the 47-nation AFC, the largest of the world soccer body’s constituent regional elements. To do so, Saudi Arabia unsuccessfully tried to create a new regional bloc, the South West Asian Football Federation (SWAFF), a potential violation of FIFA and AFC rules. The federation would have been made up of members of both the AFC and the Amman-based West Asian Football Federation (WAFF) that groups all Middle Eastern nations except for Israel and is headed by Jordanian Prince Ali Bin Al-Hussein, a prominent advocate of soccer governance reform.

The initiative fell apart when the Asian members of SWAFF walked out in October 2018 in the wake of the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The killing could also jeopardize Saudi efforts to gain control of the AFC with the Al-Sheikh-backed candidacy of Saudi Football Federation chief Adel Ezzat, who resigned in August 2018 to run for the office.

Benefits outstrip reputational risk

Al-Sheikh and his boss, Prince Mohammed, share with the crown prince’s UAE counterpart and namesake, a belief that the public diplomacy and soft power fruits of harnessing sports outstrip reputational risks. Simon Pearce, Abu Dhabi’s director of strategic communications and a director of Manchester City, the British club bought by UAE Crown Prince Mohammed’s brother but controlled by the de facto Emirati ruler’s men, said as much in leaked emails to Al-Otaiba, the UAE ambassador in Washington.

The emails discussed the UAE’s registration of a new soccer club, New York City Football Club, as the United States’ Major League Soccer newest franchise. Mr. Pearce argued that Abu Dhabi’s interests in the US political environment are best served by associating New York City FC with City Football Group, the Abu Dhabi government’s soccer investment vehicle, rather than the government itself to evade criticism stemming from the Emirates’ criminalization of homosexuality, its less than stellar record on women’s rights and its refusal to formally recognize Israel despite maintaining close security and commercial relations with the Jewish state.

The UAE’s sports-related investments, guided by the crown prince, much like the acquisition of important Qatari sports stakes on the behest of Sheikh Tamim also give Gulf states political leverage and create additional commercial opportunity. The investments constitute the flip side of large amounts of Gulf money being channelled to influential think tanks, particularly in Washington. In a series of notes in 2012, Mr. &nbsp;Pearce advised Prince Mohammed, a man obsessed with perceived threats posed by any form of political Islam and a driving force in the campaign against Qatar, to tempt than British prime minister David Cameron to counter what he described as Islamist infiltration of the BBC’s Arabic service in exchange for lucrative arms and oil deals.

To illustrate the UAE and Qatar’s sway in European soccer, Nicholas McGeehan, an independent researcher and former Human Rights Watch executive focussed on the region, looked at recent bookies odds for the Champions League. Abu Dhabi-owned Manchester City was the favourite followed by Qatar’s Paris Saint-Germain. Third up was Bayern Munich, whose shirts are sponsored by Qatar, fourth was Barcelona, which recently ended a seven-year sponsorship deal with Qatar, and fifth Real Madrid that sold the naming rights to its new stadium to Abu Dhabi.

Saudi and UAE public relations efforts to generate public pressure for a deprival of Qatari hosting rights were at times mired in controversy. The launch in May of the Foundation for Sports Integrity by Jamie Fuller, a prominent Australian campaigner for a clean-up of global soccer governance, backfired amid allegations of Saudi and UAE financial backing and Fuller’s refusal to disclose his source of funding.

Saudi and UAE media together with UK tabloid The Sun heralded the launch in a poche London hotel that involved a reiteration of assertions of Qatari wrongdoing in its successful World Cup bid. Media like Abu Dhabi’s The National and Saudi Arabia’s Al Arabiya projected the launch as pressure on FIFA to deprive Qatar of its hosting rights. “It is no secret that football’s governing body is rotten to the core. (FIFA) will rightly come under renewed pressure to strip Qatar of the competition and carry out an internal investigation in the wake of the most recent allegations. The millions of fans eagerly anticipating 2022’s festival of football deserve better,” The National said. Saudi-owned Ash-Sharq Al Awsat newspaper reported that a June 2018 FIFA Congress would hold a re-vote of the Qatari hosting. The Congress didn’t.

Qatar remains vulnerable

Despite so far successfully having defeated efforts to deprive it of its hosting rights, Qatar remains vulnerable when it comes to the integrity of its winning bid. The bid’s integrity and Sheikh Tamim’s emphasis on sports as a pillar of Qatari soft power is at stake in legal proceedings in New York and Zurich involving corruption in FIFA and potential wrongdoing in the awarding of past World Cups. Qatar has suffered reputational damage as a result of the question marks even if the Gulf crisis has allowed it to enhance its image as an underdog being bullied by the big boys on the block.

To Qatar’s credit, it has introduced reforms of its controversial kafala or labour sponsorship system that could become a model for the region. In doing so, it cemented the 2022 World Cup as one of the few mega-events with a real potential of leaving a legacy of change. Qatar started laying the foundations for that change by early on becoming the first and only Gulf state to engage with its critics, international human rights groups and trade unions.

Even so, Qatar initially suffered reputational damage on the labour front because it was relatively slow in embracing and implementing the reforms. Qatar’s handling of the Gulf crisis suggests that it has learnt from the failure of its initial response to criticism of its winning 2022 bid when it acted like an ostrich that puts its head in the sand, hoping that the storm will pass only to find that by the time it rears its head the wound has festered, and it has lost strategic advantage.

The integrity issue remains Qatar’s weak point. For activist critics of the awarding of hosting rights to Qatar, there are two questions. One is, who do they want to get in bed with? Qatar’s detractors, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia hardly have stellar human and labour rights records. If anything, their records are worse than that of Qatar, which admittedly does not glow.

The second question critics have to ask themselves is how best to leverage the World Cup, irrespective of whether the Qatari bid was compromised or not. On the assumption that it may have been compromised, the question is less how to exact retribution for a wrongdoing that was common practice in global football governance. Leveraging should focus on how to achieve a fundamental reform of global sports governance that has yet to emerge eight years into a crisis that was in part sparked by the Qatar World Cup. This goes to the heart of the fact that untouched in efforts to address the governance crisis is the corrupting, ungoverned, and incestuous relationship between sports and politics.

Siamese twins: Sports and politics

The future of the Qatar World Cup and the Gulf crisis speaks to the pervasiveness of politics in sports. The World Cup is political by definition. Retaining Qatar’s hosting rights or depriving the Gulf state of the right to host the tournament is ultimately a choice with political consequences. As long as the crisis continues, retaining rights is a testimony to Qatar’s resilience, deprival would be a victory for its detractors.

As a result, the real yardstick in the debate about the Qatari World Cup should be how the sport and the integrity of the sport benefit most. And even then, politics is never far from what the outcome of that debate is. Obviously, instinctively, the optics of no retribution raises the question of how that benefits integrity. The answer is that the potential legacy of social and economic change that is already evident with the Qatar World Cup is more important than the feel-good effect of having done the right thing with retribution or the notion of setting an example. Add to that the fact that in current circumstances, a withdrawal of hosting rights would likely be interpreted as a victory of one side over the other, further divide the Arab and Muslim world, and enhance a sense among many Muslims of being on the defensive and under attack.

The silver lining in the Gulf crisis may be the fact that it has showed up the fiction of a separation of sports and politics. FIFA, the AFC, and the Confederation of African Football (CAF), seeking to police the ban on a mixing of sports and politics, have discovered that it amounts to banging their heads against a wall. Despite their attempts to halt politics from subverting Asian tournaments, domestic and regional politics seeped into the game via different avenues.

As a result, FIFA and its regional confederations have been tying themselves up in knots. In a bizarre and contradictory sequence of events at the outset of the Gulf crisis, FIFA president Infantino rejected involving the group in the dispute by saying that “the essential role of FIFA, as I understand it, is to deal with football and not to interfere in geopolitics." Yet, on the same day that he made his statement, Mr. Infantino waded into the crisis by removing a Qatari referee from a 2018 World Cup qualifier at the request of the UAE. FIFA, beyond declaring that the decision was taken “in view of the current geopolitical situation,” appeared to be saying by implication that a Qatari by definition of his nationality could not be an honest arbiter of a soccer match involving one of his country’s detractors. In FIFA’s decision, politics trumped professionalism, no pun intended.

Similarly, the AFC was less principled in its stand towards matches pitting Saudi Arabia and Iran against one another. Iranian club Traktor Sazi was forced in February to play its home match against Al Ahli of Jeddah in Oman. It wasn’t clear why the AFC did not uphold the principle it imposed on Qatar, the UAE and Saudi Arabia in the case of Iran. “Saudi teams have been able to select host stadiums and cities, and Saudi teams will host two Iranian football representatives in the UAE and Kuwait. In return, Iranian football representatives should be able to use their own rights to choose neutral venues,” said Mohammad Reza Saket, the head of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Football Federation in a letter to the AFC.

Soccer governance bodies have long struggled to maintain the fiction of a separation in a trade-off that gave regulators greater autonomy and created the breeding ground for widespread corruption while allowing governments and politicians to manipulate the sport to their advantage as long as they were not too blatant about it. The limits of that deal are currently being defined in the Middle East, a region wracked by conflict where virtually everything is politicised. 
 
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

With the 2018 World Cup in Russia behind it, the soccer world’s focus shifts to the 2022 tournament in Qatar. Politics and the Gulf’s internecine political and legal battles have already shaped debate about FIFA’s controversial awarding of World Cup hosting rights to Qatar.

With the 2018 World Cup in Russia behind it, the soccer world’s focus shifts to the 2022 tournament in Qatar. Politics and the Gulf’s internecine political and legal battles have already shaped debate about FIFA’s controversial awarding of World Cup hosting rights to Qatar. The battles highlight not only the sport’s dominance in the Middle East by autocratic leaders but also the incestuous relationship between politics and sports that is at the root of multiple scandals that have rocked the sports world for much of this decade and compromised good governance in international sports. Three men symbolise the importance of soccer to Gulf autocrats who see the sport as a way to project their countries in a positive light on the international stage, harness its popular appeal in their cultural and public diplomacy campaigns, and leverage it as a pillar of their efforts to garner soft power: Qatari emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and his nemeses, United Arab Emirates Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed and Saudi sports czar, Turki al-Sheikh, one of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s closest associates. To be sure, the tension between Qatar and its Gulf detractors was spilling onto the soccer pitch long before the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt took their opposition to Qatari policies to a new level with the imposition in June 2017 of a diplomatic and economic boycott of Qatar. Since then, debate about the Qatari World Cup has been further politicised with the Gulf crisis driving efforts to deprive Qatar of economic and soft power benefits it derives from its hosting of the tournament, if not of the right to host the mega-sports event. The UAE-Saudi efforts took on added significance as Qatar and its detractors settled in for the long haul. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt will likely face difficult choices if the Gulf crisis persists when the World Cup, the first such mega-tournament to be held in the Middle East, kicks off in Doha in late 2022. Difficult choices The choice would involve potential political risk. It would be between maintaining the boycott that has cut off all air, sea and land links between Qatar and its detractors at the expense of fans in a soccer-crazy part of the world in which little evokes the deep-seated emotions associated with religion and football or effectively breaching the embargo to evade political backlash and ensure that supporters have access to a sports milestone in the region’s history. The starkness of the boycotting states’ dilemma would be magnified if any one of them were to qualify for the Qatar World Cup and would be enhanced if they were to play the host country or, for example, Iran. The issue of ability to attend is magnified by expectations that the demography of fans attending the World Cup in Qatar may very well be different from that at past tournaments. Qatar is likely to attract a far greater number of fans from the Middle East as well as Africa and Asia. The Asian Football Confederation’s Competition Committee has already urged governments to exempt football teams from travel bans and would almost certainly do the same for fans. As a result, the UAE-Saudi effort to undermine the Qatar World Cup is about more than seeking to deliver a body blow to Qatar. It is also about avoiding being further tied up into knots in an anti-Qatari campaign that has so far failed to break the Gulf state’s resolve, force it to concede, and garner international support. The campaign is multi-pronged and doesn’t shy away from violating laws as is evident in Saudi bootlegging to deprive beIN, the sports franchise of Qatar’s state-owned Al Jazeera television network, of the fruits of acquired rights to broadcast World Cup tournaments and European competitions at the risk of being penalized and/or taken to court by the likes of FIFA and the English Premier League. Saudi media reports that the government has launched an anti-piracy campaign, confiscating more than 4,000 illegal receivers that hacked beIN failed to put an end to the bootlegging. Signalling the political importance that men like the crown princes and Sheikh Tamim attribute to sports, a former top UAE security official, Lt. Gen. Dhahi Khalfan, suggested that the only way to resolve the Gulf crisis would be for Qatar to surrender its World Cup hosting rights. "If the World Cup leaves Qatar, Qatar's crisis will be over ... because the crisis is created to get away from it," Khalfan said. Khalfan spoke at a time that leaked documents from the email account of Yousef Al-Otaiba, the UAE ambassador in Washington and a close associate of the country’s crown prince, revealed a UAE plan to undermine Qatar’s currency by manipulating the value of bonds and derivatives. If successfully executed, the plan would have allowed Qatar’s distractors to argue that the Gulf state’s financial problems called into question its ability to organize the World Cup. Serving national interests Al-Sheikh, the chairman of the kingdom’s General Sport Authority, makes no bones about harnessing sports to serve the kingdom’s interests. With a career in security rather than sports, he was unequivocal in his assertion on the eve of Saudi Arabia’s debut in the 2018 World Cup in Russia that he made decisions based on what he deemed “Saudi Arabia’s best interest,” reaffirming the inextricable relationship between sports and politics. Barely 24 hours before the World Cup’s opening match, Saudi Arabia made good on Al-Sheikh’s assertion that the kingdom’s international sports policy would be driven by former US President George W. Bush’s post 9/11 principle of “you are either with us or against us.” With Morocco’s bid for the 2026 World Cup in mind, Mr. Al-Sheikh had warned that "to be in the grey area is no longer acceptable to us. There are those who were mistaken in their direction … If you want support, it'll be in Riyadh. What you're doing is a waste of time…," Al-Sheikh said. Al-Sheikh was referring to Morocco’s refusal to join the anti-Qatari campaign. Adopting a Saudi Arabia First approach, Mr. Al-Sheikh noted that the United States “is our biggest and strongest ally.” He recalled that when the World Cup was played in 1994 in nine American cities, the US “was one of our favourites. The fans were numerous, and the Saudi team achieved good results.” Al-Sheikh was manoeuvring at the same time to ensure that the kingdom has greater say in international soccer governance, including issues such as the fate of the Qatari World Cup and a push to extend international isolation of Iran to the realm of sports. To do so, Saudi Arabia backed a proposal to speed up the expansion of the World Cup to 48 teams from 32, which is scheduled to kick off in 2026, by making it already applicable to the 2022 World Cup. Saudi Arabia hopes that the expansion would significantly complicate Qatari preparations for the event. Implementing the expansion in 2022 would strengthen UAE and Saudi efforts to petition FIFA to force Qatar to agree to co-hosting of the World Cup by other Gulf states, a proposal that was incorporated in the UAE plan to undermine Qatar’s currency. In an indication of things to come, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) in early 2018 thwarted a UAE-Saudi attempt to get Asian tournament matches that were scheduled to be hosted by Qatar moved to a neutral venue. The AFC warned the two countries that they would be penalized if they failed to play in Doha or host Qatari teams. Al-Sheikh’s moves were part of a two-pronged Saudi-UAE effort. Global tech investor Softbank, which counts Saudi Arabia and the UAE among its largest investors, is believed to be behind a $25 billion proposal embraced by FIFA president Gianni Infantino to revamp the FIFA Club World Cup and launch of a Global Nations League tournament. If approved, the proposal would give Saudi Arabia a significant voice in global soccer governance. Complimenting the Saudi FIFA bid is an effort to expand the kingdom’s influence in the 47-nation AFC, the largest of the world soccer body’s constituent regional elements. To do so, Saudi Arabia unsuccessfully tried to create a new regional bloc, the South West Asian Football Federation (SWAFF), a potential violation of FIFA and AFC rules. The federation would have been made up of members of both the AFC and the Amman-based West Asian Football Federation (WAFF) that groups all Middle Eastern nations except for Israel and is headed by Jordanian Prince Ali Bin Al-Hussein, a prominent advocate of soccer governance reform. The initiative fell apart when the Asian members of SWAFF walked out in October 2018 in the wake of the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The killing could also jeopardize Saudi efforts to gain control of the AFC with the Al-Sheikh-backed candidacy of Saudi Football Federation chief Adel Ezzat, who resigned in August 2018 to run for the office. Benefits outstrip reputational risk Al-Sheikh and his boss, Prince Mohammed, share with the crown prince’s UAE counterpart and namesake, a belief that the public diplomacy and soft power fruits of harnessing sports outstrip reputational risks. Simon Pearce, Abu Dhabi’s director of strategic communications and a director of Manchester City, the British club bought by UAE Crown Prince Mohammed’s brother but controlled by the de facto Emirati ruler’s men, said as much in leaked emails to Al-Otaiba, the UAE ambassador in Washington. The emails discussed the UAE’s registration of a new soccer club, New York City Football Club, as the United States’ Major League Soccer newest franchise. Mr. Pearce argued that Abu Dhabi’s interests in the US political environment are best served by associating New York City FC with City Football Group, the Abu Dhabi government’s soccer investment vehicle, rather than the government itself to evade criticism stemming from the Emirates’ criminalization of homosexuality, its less than stellar record on women’s rights and its refusal to formally recognize Israel despite maintaining close security and commercial relations with the Jewish state. The UAE’s sports-related investments, guided by the crown prince, much like the acquisition of important Qatari sports stakes on the behest of Sheikh Tamim also give Gulf states political leverage and create additional commercial opportunity. The investments constitute the flip side of large amounts of Gulf money being channelled to influential think tanks, particularly in Washington. In a series of notes in 2012, Mr. Pearce advised Prince Mohammed, a man obsessed with perceived threats posed by any form of political Islam and a driving force in the campaign against Qatar, to tempt than British prime minister David Cameron to counter what he described as Islamist infiltration of the BBC’s Arabic service in exchange for lucrative arms and oil deals. To illustrate the UAE and Qatar’s sway in European soccer, Nicholas McGeehan, an independent researcher and former Human Rights Watch executive focussed on the region, looked at recent bookies odds for the Champions League. Abu Dhabi-owned Manchester City was the favourite followed by Qatar’s Paris Saint-Germain. Third up was Bayern Munich, whose shirts are sponsored by Qatar, fourth was Barcelona, which recently ended a seven-year sponsorship deal with Qatar, and fifth Real Madrid that sold the naming rights to its new stadium to Abu Dhabi. Saudi and UAE public relations efforts to generate public pressure for a deprival of Qatari hosting rights were at times mired in controversy. The launch in May of the Foundation for Sports Integrity by Jamie Fuller, a prominent Australian campaigner for a clean-up of global soccer governance, backfired amid allegations of Saudi and UAE financial backing and Fuller’s refusal to disclose his source of funding. Saudi and UAE media together with UK tabloid The Sun heralded the launch in a poche London hotel that involved a reiteration of assertions of Qatari wrongdoing in its successful World Cup bid. Media like Abu Dhabi’s The National and Saudi Arabia’s Al Arabiya projected the launch as pressure on FIFA to deprive Qatar of its hosting rights. “It is no secret that football’s governing body is rotten to the core. (FIFA) will rightly come under renewed pressure to strip Qatar of the competition and carry out an internal investigation in the wake of the most recent allegations. The millions of fans eagerly anticipating 2022’s festival of football deserve better,” The National said. Saudi-owned Ash-Sharq Al Awsat newspaper reported that a June 2018 FIFA Congress would hold a re-vote of the Qatari hosting. The Congress didn’t. Qatar remains vulnerable Despite so far successfully having defeated efforts to deprive it of its hosting rights, Qatar remains vulnerable when it comes to the integrity of its winning bid. The bid’s integrity and Sheikh Tamim’s emphasis on sports as a pillar of Qatari soft power is at stake in legal proceedings in New York and Zurich involving corruption in FIFA and potential wrongdoing in the awarding of past World Cups. Qatar has suffered reputational damage as a result of the question marks even if the Gulf crisis has allowed it to enhance its image as an underdog being bullied by the big boys on the block. To Qatar’s credit, it has introduced reforms of its controversial kafala or labour sponsorship system that could become a model for the region. In doing so, it cemented the 2022 World Cup as one of the few mega-events with a real potential of leaving a legacy of change. Qatar started laying the foundations for that change by early on becoming the first and only Gulf state to engage with its critics, international human rights groups and trade unions. Even so, Qatar initially suffered reputational damage on the labour front because it was relatively slow in embracing and implementing the reforms. Qatar’s handling of the Gulf crisis suggests that it has learnt from the failure of its initial response to criticism of its winning 2022 bid when it acted like an ostrich that puts its head in the sand, hoping that the storm will pass only to find that by the time it rears its head the wound has festered, and it has lost strategic advantage. The integrity issue remains Qatar’s weak point. For activist critics of the awarding of hosting rights to Qatar, there are two questions. One is, who do they want to get in bed with? Qatar’s detractors, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia hardly have stellar human and labour rights records. If anything, their records are worse than that of Qatar, which admittedly does not glow. The second question critics have to ask themselves is how best to leverage the World Cup, irrespective of whether the Qatari bid was compromised or not. On the assumption that it may have been compromised, the question is less how to exact retribution for a wrongdoing that was common practice in global football governance. Leveraging should focus on how to achieve a fundamental reform of global sports governance that has yet to emerge eight years into a crisis that was in part sparked by the Qatar World Cup. This goes to the heart of the fact that untouched in efforts to address the governance crisis is the corrupting, ungoverned, and incestuous relationship between sports and politics. Siamese twins: Sports and politics The future of the Qatar World Cup and the Gulf crisis speaks to the pervasiveness of politics in sports. The World Cup is political by definition. Retaining Qatar’s hosting rights or depriving the Gulf state of the right to host the tournament is ultimately a choice with political consequences. As long as the crisis continues, retaining rights is a testimony to Qatar’s resilience, deprival would be a victory for its detractors. As a result, the real yardstick in the debate about the Qatari World Cup should be how the sport and the integrity of the sport benefit most. And even then, politics is never far from what the outcome of that debate is. Obviously, instinctively, the optics of no retribution raises the question of how that benefits integrity. The answer is that the potential legacy of social and economic change that is already evident with the Qatar World Cup is more important than the feel-good effect of having done the right thing with retribution or the notion of setting an example. Add to that the fact that in current circumstances, a withdrawal of hosting rights would likely be interpreted as a victory of one side over the other, further divide the Arab and Muslim world, and enhance a sense among many Muslims of being on the defensive and under attack. The silver lining in the Gulf crisis may be the fact that it has showed up the fiction of a separation of sports and politics. FIFA, the AFC, and the Confederation of African Football (CAF), seeking to police the ban on a mixing of sports and politics, have discovered that it amounts to banging their heads against a wall. Despite their attempts to halt politics from subverting Asian tournaments, domestic and regional politics seeped into the game via different avenues. As a result, FIFA and its regional confederations have been tying themselves up in knots. In a bizarre and contradictory sequence of events at the outset of the Gulf crisis, FIFA president Infantino rejected involving the group in the dispute by saying that “the essential role of FIFA, as I understand it, is to deal with football and not to interfere in geopolitics." Yet, on the same day that he made his statement, Mr. Infantino waded into the crisis by removing a Qatari referee from a 2018 World Cup qualifier at the request of the UAE. FIFA, beyond declaring that the decision was taken “in view of the current geopolitical situation,” appeared to be saying by implication that a Qatari by definition of his nationality could not be an honest arbiter of a soccer match involving one of his country’s detractors. In FIFA’s decision, politics trumped professionalism, no pun intended. Similarly, the AFC was less principled in its stand towards matches pitting Saudi Arabia and Iran against one another. Iranian club Traktor Sazi was forced in February to play its home match against Al Ahli of Jeddah in Oman. It wasn’t clear why the AFC did not uphold the principle it imposed on Qatar, the UAE and Saudi Arabia in the case of Iran. “Saudi teams have been able to select host stadiums and cities, and Saudi teams will host two Iranian football representatives in the UAE and Kuwait. In return, Iranian football representatives should be able to use their own rights to choose neutral venues,” said Mohammad Reza Saket, the head of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Football Federation in a letter to the AFC. Soccer governance bodies have long struggled to maintain the fiction of a separation in a trade-off that gave regulators greater autonomy and created the breeding ground for widespread corruption while allowing governments and politicians to manipulate the sport to their advantage as long as they were not too blatant about it. The limits of that deal are currently being defined in the Middle East, a region wracked by conflict where virtually everything is politicised. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

Gulf rivalries spill onto the soccer pitch

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/reject-us-senate-inference-in-our-internal-affairs-saudi-arabia-on-khashoggi-case-184625">Reject US Senate interference in our internal affairs: Saudi Arabia on Khashoggi case</a>

Saudi Arabia on Sunday rejected as "interference" a US Senate resolution to end American military support for a Riyadh-led war in Yemen, and another holding its crown prince responsible for the murder of critic Jamal Khashoggi.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/facebook-temporarily-banned-israel-pms-son-yair-netanyahu-for-anti-muslim-posts-184617">Facebook temporarily banned Israel PM's son Yair Netanyahu for anti-Muslim posts</a>

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's eldest, Yair, has tweeted that Facebook blocked his page for 24 hours over apparent anti-Muslim posts and called the leading social network a "dictatorship".

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/sports/harbhajan-broke-down-crying-while-apologising-for-monkeygate-andrew-symonds-184623">Harbhajan 'broke down crying' while 'apologising' for </a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/sports/harbhajan-broke-down-crying-while-apologising-for-monkeygate-andrew-symonds-184623">monkeygate</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/sports/harbhajan-broke-down-crying-while-apologising-for-monkeygate-andrew-symonds-184623">: Symonds</a>

Andrew Symonds says India spinner Harbhajan Singh "broke down crying" while making peace after the infamous 'monkeygate' episode had sent the former Australian all-rounder into a downward spiral.&nbsp;

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/india-news/cyclone-phethai-likely-to-make-landfall-in-coastal-andhra-today-afternoon-high-alert-sounded-184622">Cyclone 'Phethai' likely to make landfall in coastal Andhra today, high alert sounded</a>

The Met department on Sunday warned of heavy rain in many districts of South Bengal on Monday as an effect of the cyclone 'Phethai', which is likely to make landfall in Andhra Pradesh today afternoon.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/business-economy/petrol-diesel-prices-rise-on-thursday-check-todays-rates-184629">Petrol, Diesel prices rise again: Check today's rates in metro cities</a>

On a downswing for the last two months, petrol and diesel prices once again increased on Monday by 19 paise in New Delhi.

Both petrol and diesel prices hiked for the first time since October 16, by 19-20 paise &amp; 9 paise respectively, across 4 major cities.

Reject US Senate interference in our internal affairs: Saudi Arabia on Khashoggi case Saudi Arabia on Sunday rejected as "interference" a US Senate resolution to end American military support for a Riyadh-led war in Yemen, and another holding its crown prince responsible for the murder of critic Jamal Khashoggi.

Reject US Senate interference in our internal affairs: Saudi Arabia on Khashoggi case Saudi Arabia on Sunday rejected as "interference" a US Senate resolution to end American military support for a Riyadh-led war in Yemen, and another holding its crown prince responsible for the murder of critic Jamal Khashoggi. Facebook temporarily banned Israel PM's son Yair Netanyahu for anti-Muslim posts Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's eldest, Yair, has tweeted that Facebook blocked his page for 24 hours over apparent anti-Muslim posts and called the leading social network a "dictatorship". Harbhajan 'broke down crying' while 'apologising' for monkeygate: Symonds Andrew Symonds says India spinner Harbhajan Singh "broke down crying" while making peace after the infamous 'monkeygate' episode had sent the former Australian all-rounder into a downward spiral. Cyclone 'Phethai' likely to make landfall in coastal Andhra today, high alert sounded The Met department on Sunday warned of heavy rain in many districts of South Bengal on Monday as an effect of the cyclone 'Phethai', which is likely to make landfall in Andhra Pradesh today afternoon. Petrol, Diesel prices rise again: Check today's rates in metro cities On a downswing for the last two months, petrol and diesel prices once again increased on Monday by 19 paise in New Delhi. Both petrol and diesel prices hiked for the first time since October 16, by 19-20 paise & 9 paise respectively, across 4 major cities.

News brief: Big stories of the day

UN chief Antonio Guterres called Sunday for a "credible" probe into journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder in Saudi Arabia's consulate in Istanbul.&nbsp;

"It is absolutely essential to have a credible investigation and to have <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/top-us-senators-briefed-by-cia-blame-saudi-prince-for-khashoggi-death-181524">the punishment of those that were guilty</a>," Guterres said at a conference in Doha.

The UN chief said he had no information on the case except what had been reported in the media.&nbsp;

Khashoggi, a Saudi contributor to the Washington Post, was killed on October 2 shortly after entering the kingdom's consulate in what Riyadh called a "rogue" operation.

Saudi Arabia has repeatedly rejected Turkish demands to extradite suspects connected to the murder of the journalist, a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Turkey's foreign minister said Saturday that his country would "not give up" on establishing the truth about the murder.

"We haven't received any new information or outcome of the investigation from the Saudi side," Mevlut Cavusoglu said, also in Qatar which has been the target of a Saudi-led boycott since June 2017.

"Turkey will not give up on this, we will go to the end."

Earlier this month, the minister said Turkey was in talks over a possible United Nations investigation into the killing which has provoked global outrage.

According to Turkey, a 15-member Saudi team was sent to Istanbul to kill Khashoggi, a palace insider turned critic of the regime.

Riyadh has since detained 21 people over the murder.

Despite speculation that the powerful crown prince ordered the hit, the kingdom has strongly denied he was involved.

The murder has damaged Riyadh's international reputation, and Western countries including the United States, France and Canada have placed sanctions on nearly 20 Saudi nationals.

&nbsp;

UN chief Antonio Guterres called Sunday for a "credible" probe into journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder in Saudi Arabia's consulate in Istanbul. "It is absolutely essential to have a credible investigation and to have the punishment of those that were guilty," Guterres said at a conference in Doha.

UN chief Antonio Guterres called Sunday for a "credible" probe into journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder in Saudi Arabia's consulate in Istanbul. "It is absolutely essential to have a credible investigation and to have the punishment of those that were guilty," Guterres said at a conference in Doha. The UN chief said he had no information on the case except what had been reported in the media. Khashoggi, a Saudi contributor to the Washington Post, was killed on October 2 shortly after entering the kingdom's consulate in what Riyadh called a "rogue" operation. Saudi Arabia has repeatedly rejected Turkish demands to extradite suspects connected to the murder of the journalist, a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Turkey's foreign minister said Saturday that his country would "not give up" on establishing the truth about the murder. "We haven't received any new information or outcome of the investigation from the Saudi side," Mevlut Cavusoglu said, also in Qatar which has been the target of a Saudi-led boycott since June 2017. "Turkey will not give up on this, we will go to the end." Earlier this month, the minister said Turkey was in talks over a possible United Nations investigation into the killing which has provoked global outrage. According to Turkey, a 15-member Saudi team was sent to Istanbul to kill Khashoggi, a palace insider turned critic of the regime. Riyadh has since detained 21 people over the murder. Despite speculation that the powerful crown prince ordered the hit, the kingdom has strongly denied he was involved. The murder has damaged Riyadh's international reputation, and Western countries including the United States, France and Canada have placed sanctions on nearly 20 Saudi nationals.

UN chief Guterres calls for 'credible' probe into Khashoggi murder

One of the killers of <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/jamal-khashoggi-other-journalists-are-named-time-magazines-person-of-the-year-183310">Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi</a> was heard saying "I know how to cut" on the audio of the killing <a href="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.wionews.com/world/turkey-says-saudi-explanation-of-khashoggi-murder-insufficient-177552&amp;sa=U&amp;ved=0ahUKEwiq9rHz4J_fAhUSfysKHfsKA0YQFggLMAI&amp;client=internal-uds-cse&amp;cx=006054055338965708568:09spwrlibei&amp;usg=AOvVaw2cWLXWUSZ48SqiAqT5Md0R">Turkey </a>shared with US and European officials, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday.

Erdogan also slammed Riyadh for its changing account of how <a href="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.wionews.com/world/khashoggi-was-dead-in-twenty-minutes-says-tura-khislakchi-as-he-unfolds-the-incident-to-wion-173771&amp;sa=U&amp;ved=0ahUKEwiq9rHz4J_fAhUSfysKHfsKA0YQFggOMAM&amp;client=internal-uds-cse&amp;cx=006054055338965708568:09spwrlibei&amp;usg=AOvVaw3a1fWsJTJ_YSwkuOze_H31">Khashoggi</a>, a Washington Post columnist and prominent critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2. The journalist had gone there to collect documents for his forthcoming marriage.

The case has caused global outrage and has damaged the international standing of the 33-year-old crown prince, the kingdom's de facto ruler. The US Senate on Thursday delivered a rare rebuke to President Donald Trump for his support of the crown prince, whom it blamed for the killing.

"The United States, Germany, France, Canada, we made them all listen... The man clearly says 'I know how to cut'. This man is a soldier. These are all in the audio recordings," Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul. He did not give further details about the recording.

Body not found

Istanbul's chief prosecutor has said Khashoggi was suffocated by his killers in the consulate, before his body was dismembered and disposed of. His remains have not been found.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/washington-post-publishes-jamal-khashoggis-last-piece-172051">Khashoggi</a> repeatedly told his killers "I can't breathe" during his final moments, CNN reported on Monday, quoting a source who said they had read the full translated transcript of an audio recording. Saudi Arabia has said the prince had no prior knowledge of the murder. After offering numerous contradictory explanations, Riyadh later said Khashoggi had been killed when negotiations to persuade him to return to Saudi Arabia failed.

Erdogan renewed his criticism of Riyadh's explanation of the killing. Originally it had said Khashoggi had left the consulate. That was disputed by his Turkish fiancee, who had waited outside the building and said he never emerged.

"The prince says Jamal Khashoggi left the consulate. Is Jamal Khashoggi a kid? His fiancee is waiting outside," Erdogan said. "They think the world is dumb. This nation isn't dumb and it knows how to hold people accountable."

Turkish officials said last week that the Istanbul prosecutor's office had concluded there was "strong suspicion" that Saud al-Qahtani, a top aide to Prince Mohammed, and General Ahmed al-Asiri, who served as deputy head of foreign intelligence, were among the planners of Khashoggi's killing.

After Riyadh ruled out extraditing the two men, Turkey said this week that the world should seek out justice for Khashoggi under international law.

Erdogan has repeatedly said he would not give up the case. Trump has said he wants Washington to stand by the Saudi government and the prince, despite the CIA assessment that it was probably the prince who ordered Khashoggi's killing.

One of the killers of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was heard saying "I know how to cut" on the audio of the killing Turkey shared with US and European officials, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday.

One of the killers of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was heard saying "I know how to cut" on the audio of the killing Turkey shared with US and European officials, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday. Erdogan also slammed Riyadh for its changing account of how Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and prominent critic of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2. The journalist had gone there to collect documents for his forthcoming marriage. The case has caused global outrage and has damaged the international standing of the 33-year-old crown prince, the kingdom's de facto ruler. The US Senate on Thursday delivered a rare rebuke to President Donald Trump for his support of the crown prince, whom it blamed for the killing. "The United States, Germany, France, Canada, we made them all listen... The man clearly says 'I know how to cut'. This man is a soldier. These are all in the audio recordings," Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul. He did not give further details about the recording. Body not found Istanbul's chief prosecutor has said Khashoggi was suffocated by his killers in the consulate, before his body was dismembered and disposed of. His remains have not been found. Khashoggi repeatedly told his killers "I can't breathe" during his final moments, CNN reported on Monday, quoting a source who said they had read the full translated transcript of an audio recording. Saudi Arabia has said the prince had no prior knowledge of the murder. After offering numerous contradictory explanations, Riyadh later said Khashoggi had been killed when negotiations to persuade him to return to Saudi Arabia failed. Erdogan renewed his criticism of Riyadh's explanation of the killing. Originally it had said Khashoggi had left the consulate. That was disputed by his Turkish fiancee, who had waited outside the building and said he never emerged. "The prince says Jamal Khashoggi left the consulate. Is Jamal Khashoggi a kid? His fiancee is waiting outside," Erdogan said. "They think the world is dumb. This nation isn't dumb and it knows how to hold people accountable." Turkish officials said last week that the Istanbul prosecutor's office had concluded there was "strong suspicion" that Saud al-Qahtani, a top aide to Prince Mohammed, and General Ahmed al-Asiri, who served as deputy head of foreign intelligence, were among the planners of Khashoggi's killing. After Riyadh ruled out extraditing the two men, Turkey said this week that the world should seek out justice for Khashoggi under international law. Erdogan has repeatedly said he would not give up the case. Trump has said he wants Washington to stand by the Saudi government and the prince, despite the CIA assessment that it was probably the prince who ordered Khashoggi's killing.

One of Khashoggi killers said 'I know how to cut' on audio: President Tayyip Erdogan

The US Senate delivered a rare double rebuke to <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/china-going-to-open-up-whole-country-they-want-to-please-me-trump-183898">President Donald Trump</a> on Saudi Arabia on Thursday, voting to end US military support for the war in Yemen and blame the Saudi crown prince for the murder of <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/must-not-forget-true-message-in-his-work-jamal-khashoggis-editor-183554">journalist Jamal Khashoggi</a>.

The votes were largely symbolic because to become law the resolutions would have to pass the House of Representatives, whose Republican leaders have blocked any legislation intended to rebuke the Saudis.

In a historic move, Senators voted 56-41 to end US military support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen's civil war. The conflict has killed tens of thousands of people and spawned what the United Nations calls the world's most dire human crisis, with the country on the brink of famine.

It was the first time either chamber of Congress had backed a resolution to withdraw US forces from a military engagement under the War Powers Act. That law, passed in 1973, limits the president's ability to commit US forces to potential hostilities without congressional approval.

Seven of Trump's fellow Republicans joined Senate Democrats to back the measure.

Immediately after the Yemen vote, the Senate backed a resolution blaming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for Khashoggi's murder and insisting that Saudi Arabia hold accountable anyone responsible for his death.

Khashoggi, a US&nbsp;resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. The Senate vote, which was unanimous, puts pressure on House leaders to allow a vote on the Khashoggi resolution this month, before Congress adjourns for the year.

"Unanimously, the United States Senate has said that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. That is a strong statement. I think it speaks to the values that we hold dear," said Republican Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and sponsor of the resolution.

Trump has said he wants Washington to stand by the Saudi government and the prince, despite a CIA assessment it was likely he ordered Khashoggi's killing. He promised to veto the war powers resolution.

Opponents of the resolution are reluctant to take any action to disrupt the strategic US relationship with Saudi Arabia, seen as an essential counterweight in the Middle East to Iran, arch-enemy of close US ally Israel.

Administration officials also see Saudi support as a linchpin for an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan yet to be unveiled by the Trump administration. And they have argued that ending US&nbsp;support could complicate Yemen peace talks.

'SHARED STRATEGIC INTERESTS'

Asked to comment on the Khashoggi resolution, a White House spokesperson noted sanctions imposed on 17 Saudis over the killing and said, "Our shared strategic interests with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia remain, and we continue to view as achievable the twin imperatives of protecting America and holding accountable those responsible for the killing."

But backers of the resolutions, including some Republicans, promised to press ahead. On Wednesday, a bipartisan group of senators promised to push in the new Congress legislation for humanitarian sanctions and a ban on weapons sales to Saudi Arabia.

"What's next is to do everything possible to demand that the House of Representatives do what the members of the House want done, an opportunity to vote on this," Senator Bernie Sanders told Reuters.

Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, said he would bring the resolution up again after the new Congress convenes in January, when Democrats will control the House of Representatives. The measure could pass the Senate again, given the bipartisan support it received on Thursday, even though Trump's Republicans will have a larger majority in the upper chamber next year.

"I think we're going to win in the Senate and I think we are going to do what the American people want, that is to end our participation in this horrific and destructive war," Sanders said.

There was no immediate word from House leadership on whether they would allow a vote on either resolution.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who briefed House members on Thursday, urged senators during a briefing last month to keep supporting the Saudi-led coalition.

Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said her members supported congressional action. "There certainly is an appetite in our caucus for that," Pelosi, who is expected to be the next House Speaker, told reporters.

Yemen's warring parties agreed on Thursday to cease fighting for the Houthi-held port city of Hodeidah and withdraw their troops, the first significant breakthrough for UN-led peace efforts in five years of conflict.

The US Senate delivered a rare double rebuke to President Donald Trump on Saudi Arabia on Thursday, voting to end US military support for the war in Yemen and blame the Saudi crown prince for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The US Senate delivered a rare double rebuke to President Donald Trump on Saudi Arabia on Thursday, voting to end US military support for the war in Yemen and blame the Saudi crown prince for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The votes were largely symbolic because to become law the resolutions would have to pass the House of Representatives, whose Republican leaders have blocked any legislation intended to rebuke the Saudis. In a historic move, Senators voted 56-41 to end US military support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen's civil war. The conflict has killed tens of thousands of people and spawned what the United Nations calls the world's most dire human crisis, with the country on the brink of famine. It was the first time either chamber of Congress had backed a resolution to withdraw US forces from a military engagement under the War Powers Act. That law, passed in 1973, limits the president's ability to commit US forces to potential hostilities without congressional approval. Seven of Trump's fellow Republicans joined Senate Democrats to back the measure. Immediately after the Yemen vote, the Senate backed a resolution blaming Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for Khashoggi's murder and insisting that Saudi Arabia hold accountable anyone responsible for his death. Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. The Senate vote, which was unanimous, puts pressure on House leaders to allow a vote on the Khashoggi resolution this month, before Congress adjourns for the year. "Unanimously, the United States Senate has said that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. That is a strong statement. I think it speaks to the values that we hold dear," said Republican Senator Bob Corker, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and sponsor of the resolution. Trump has said he wants Washington to stand by the Saudi government and the prince, despite a CIA assessment it was likely he ordered Khashoggi's killing. He promised to veto the war powers resolution. Opponents of the resolution are reluctant to take any action to disrupt the strategic US relationship with Saudi Arabia, seen as an essential counterweight in the Middle East to Iran, arch-enemy of close US ally Israel. Administration officials also see Saudi support as a linchpin for an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan yet to be unveiled by the Trump administration. And they have argued that ending US support could complicate Yemen peace talks. 'SHARED STRATEGIC INTERESTS' Asked to comment on the Khashoggi resolution, a White House spokesperson noted sanctions imposed on 17 Saudis over the killing and said, "Our shared strategic interests with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia remain, and we continue to view as achievable the twin imperatives of protecting America and holding accountable those responsible for the killing." But backers of the resolutions, including some Republicans, promised to press ahead. On Wednesday, a bipartisan group of senators promised to push in the new Congress legislation for humanitarian sanctions and a ban on weapons sales to Saudi Arabia. "What's next is to do everything possible to demand that the House of Representatives do what the members of the House want done, an opportunity to vote on this," Senator Bernie Sanders told Reuters. Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, said he would bring the resolution up again after the new Congress convenes in January, when Democrats will control the House of Representatives. The measure could pass the Senate again, given the bipartisan support it received on Thursday, even though Trump's Republicans will have a larger majority in the upper chamber next year. "I think we're going to win in the Senate and I think we are going to do what the American people want, that is to end our participation in this horrific and destructive war," Sanders said. There was no immediate word from House leadership on whether they would allow a vote on either resolution. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who briefed House members on Thursday, urged senators during a briefing last month to keep supporting the Saudi-led coalition. Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said her members supported congressional action. "There certainly is an appetite in our caucus for that," Pelosi, who is expected to be the next House Speaker, told reporters. Yemen's warring parties agreed on Thursday to cease fighting for the Houthi-held port city of Hodeidah and withdraw their troops, the first significant breakthrough for UN-led peace efforts in five years of conflict.

Senate rebukes Trump on Saudi Arabia, blames prince Salman for Khashoggi murder

Cash-strapped Pakistan on Friday received US&nbsp;$1 billion from its close ally Saudi Arabia as part of a second bailout package to boost the country's <a href="http://www.wionews.com/opinions/where-is-debt-ridden-pakistan-heading-175637">dwindling dollar reserves</a>, according to media reports.

The latest package has shored up the central bank's foreign reserves, hitting the US $9.4 billion mark, said State Bank of Pakistan Spokesman Abid Qamar.

He said another Saudi financial package was expected in January next year, Dawn newspaper reported.

In October, Saudi Arabia agreed to provide Pakistan US $3 billion in foreign currency support for a year to address its balance-of-payments crisis.

During Prime Minister Imran Khan's visit to Saudi Arabia on October 23, it was announced that the oil-rich country will provide a US $6 billion package to Pakistan to support its ailing economy.

The package included US $3 billion balance of payments support and US $3 billion in deferred payments on oil import.

Pakistan received the first tranche of US $1 billion from Saudi Arabia on November 9.

According to figures shared by Prime Minister Khan in October, the country's total foreign debt has surged to Rs 30,000 billion within the last decade, while circular debt has reached Rs 1,200 billion, the report said.

The ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government has also approached China, the UAE and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to seek packages to support the economy.

The second Saudi instalment will bolster Pakistan's foreign exchange reserves, which fell to US $7.3 billion in the week ended December 7 - the lowest in more than four and a half years.

Cash-strapped Pakistan on Friday received US $1 billion from its close ally Saudi Arabia as part of a second bailout package to boost the country's dwindling dollar reserves, according to media reports.

Cash-strapped Pakistan on Friday received US $1 billion from its close ally Saudi Arabia as part of a second bailout package to boost the country's dwindling dollar reserves, according to media reports. The latest package has shored up the central bank's foreign reserves, hitting the US $9.4 billion mark, said State Bank of Pakistan Spokesman Abid Qamar. He said another Saudi financial package was expected in January next year, Dawn newspaper reported. In October, Saudi Arabia agreed to provide Pakistan US $3 billion in foreign currency support for a year to address its balance-of-payments crisis. During Prime Minister Imran Khan's visit to Saudi Arabia on October 23, it was announced that the oil-rich country will provide a US $6 billion package to Pakistan to support its ailing economy. The package included US $3 billion balance of payments support and US $3 billion in deferred payments on oil import. Pakistan received the first tranche of US $1 billion from Saudi Arabia on November 9. According to figures shared by Prime Minister Khan in October, the country's total foreign debt has surged to Rs 30,000 billion within the last decade, while circular debt has reached Rs 1,200 billion, the report said. The ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government has also approached China, the UAE and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to seek packages to support the economy. The second Saudi instalment will bolster Pakistan's foreign exchange reserves, which fell to US $7.3 billion in the week ended December 7 - the lowest in more than four and a half years.

Pakistan receives second US $1 billion bailout package from Saudi Arabia

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/south-asia/pakistan-army-pledges-to-support-stakeholders-to-bring-afghan-war-to-peaceful-conclusion-183904">Pakistan</a>'s Finance Minister Asad Umar said Thursday that an incoming investment package from Saudi Arabia would be "the biggest foreign investment" in the country's history.

The announcement of the package will be made following a cabinet approval next week, the Dawn reported.

"The ball is in our court. We have to get cabinet approval next week, after which an announcement will be made," the paper quoted Umar as saying at an event in Islamabad.

Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have been in talks recently over a bailout package for Islamabad.

At a time when various foreign countries and business delegations were pulling out of an investment conference in Saudi after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Kingdom's consulate in Istanbul, Prime Minister Imran Khan attended the event, inviting foreign investors to put their money into projects in Pakistan.

Saudi Arabia announced to provide cash-strapped Pakistan $3 billion in balance of payment support and additionally give oil worth $3 billion on deferred payment after Prime Minister Khan met Saudi King Salman in Riyadh October.

Pakistan's Finance Minister Asad Umar said Thursday that an incoming investment package from Saudi Arabia would be "the biggest foreign investment" in the country's history.

Pakistan's Finance Minister Asad Umar said Thursday that an incoming investment package from Saudi Arabia would be "the biggest foreign investment" in the country's history. The announcement of the package will be made following a cabinet approval next week, the Dawn reported. "The ball is in our court. We have to get cabinet approval next week, after which an announcement will be made," the paper quoted Umar as saying at an event in Islamabad. Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have been in talks recently over a bailout package for Islamabad. At a time when various foreign countries and business delegations were pulling out of an investment conference in Saudi after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Kingdom's consulate in Istanbul, Prime Minister Imran Khan attended the event, inviting foreign investors to put their money into projects in Pakistan. Saudi Arabia announced to provide cash-strapped Pakistan $3 billion in balance of payment support and additionally give oil worth $3 billion on deferred payment after Prime Minister Khan met Saudi King Salman in Riyadh October.

Saudi package would be 'biggest foreign investment' in Pak history: Finance Minister Asad Umar 

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/donald-trump-chooses-new-joint-chiefs-of-staff-chairman-against-pentagon-chief-jim-mattis-wishes-182563">US President Donald Trump</a> said on Tuesday that he stood by Saudi Arabia's crown prince despite a CIA assessment that he ordered the killing of journalist <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/jamal-khashoggi-other-journalists-are-named-time-magazines-person-of-the-year-183310">Jamal Khashoggi</a> and pleas from US senators for Trump to condemn the kingdom's de facto ruler.

Trump refused to comment on whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was complicit in the murder, but he provided perhaps his most explicit show of support for the prince since Khashoggi's death more than two months ago.

"He's the leader of Saudi Arabia. They've been a very good ally," Trump said in an interview in the Oval Office.

Asked by Reuters if standing by the kingdom meant standing by the prince, known as MbS, Trump responded: "Well, at this moment, it certainly does."

Some members of Saudi Arabia's ruling family are agitating to prevent MbS from becoming king, sources close to the royal court have told Reuters, and believe that the United States and Trump could play a determining role.

"I just haven't heard that," Trump said. "Honestly, I can't comment on it because I had not heard that at all. In fact, if anything, I've heard that he's very strongly in power."

While Trump has condemned the murder of Khashoggi, a US resident and Washington Post columnist who was often critical of MbS, he has given the benefit of the doubt to the prince with whom he has cultivated a deep relationship.

Trump again reiterated on Tuesday that the "crown prince vehemently denies" involvement in a killing that has sparked outrage around the world.

Trump has come under fierce criticism from fellow Republicans in the Senate over the issue, particularly after CIA Director Gina Haspel briefed them. Last month, the CIA assessed that MbS ordered the killing, which Trump called "very premature."

"You have to be willfully blind not to come to the conclusion that this was orchestrated and organised by people under the command of MbS," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, said last week.

MEETING WITH SENATORS

Graham and other senators who have supported the US-Saudi alliance over the years have said that Trump should impose more sanctions after a first-round targeted 17 Saudis for their alleged role in the killing in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2.

As the Senate considers this week a joint resolution condemning the crown prince for the killing, something that the president would have to sign or veto if passed by Congress, Trump said he would meet with senators.

Trump said he hoped senators would not propose stopping arms sales to the Saudis, deals he has doggedly fought to save ever since the gruesome details of Khashoggi's murder were leaked by Turkey.

"And I really hope that people aren't going to suggest that we should not take hundreds of billions of dollars that they’re going to siphon off to Russia and to China," Trump said.

Trump said he could abide by legislation ending US support for the Saudi-led war effort in Yemen, a proxy war with regional rival Iran that has led to a deepening humanitarian disaster.

"Well, I'm much more open to Yemen because frankly, I hate to see what's going on in Yemen," Trump said. "But it takes two to tango. I'd want to see Iran pull out of Yemen too. Because - and I think they will."

US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he stood by Saudi Arabia's crown prince despite a CIA assessment that he ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and pleas from US senators for Trump to condemn the kingdom's de facto ruler.

US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that he stood by Saudi Arabia's crown prince despite a CIA assessment that he ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and pleas from US senators for Trump to condemn the kingdom's de facto ruler. Trump refused to comment on whether Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was complicit in the murder, but he provided perhaps his most explicit show of support for the prince since Khashoggi's death more than two months ago. "He's the leader of Saudi Arabia. They've been a very good ally," Trump said in an interview in the Oval Office. Asked by Reuters if standing by the kingdom meant standing by the prince, known as MbS, Trump responded: "Well, at this moment, it certainly does." Some members of Saudi Arabia's ruling family are agitating to prevent MbS from becoming king, sources close to the royal court have told Reuters, and believe that the United States and Trump could play a determining role. "I just haven't heard that," Trump said. "Honestly, I can't comment on it because I had not heard that at all. In fact, if anything, I've heard that he's very strongly in power." While Trump has condemned the murder of Khashoggi, a US resident and Washington Post columnist who was often critical of MbS, he has given the benefit of the doubt to the prince with whom he has cultivated a deep relationship. Trump again reiterated on Tuesday that the "crown prince vehemently denies" involvement in a killing that has sparked outrage around the world. Trump has come under fierce criticism from fellow Republicans in the Senate over the issue, particularly after CIA Director Gina Haspel briefed them. Last month, the CIA assessed that MbS ordered the killing, which Trump called "very premature." "You have to be willfully blind not to come to the conclusion that this was orchestrated and organised by people under the command of MbS," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, said last week. MEETING WITH SENATORS Graham and other senators who have supported the US-Saudi alliance over the years have said that Trump should impose more sanctions after a first-round targeted 17 Saudis for their alleged role in the killing in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2. As the Senate considers this week a joint resolution condemning the crown prince for the killing, something that the president would have to sign or veto if passed by Congress, Trump said he would meet with senators. Trump said he hoped senators would not propose stopping arms sales to the Saudis, deals he has doggedly fought to save ever since the gruesome details of Khashoggi's murder were leaked by Turkey. "And I really hope that people aren't going to suggest that we should not take hundreds of billions of dollars that they’re going to siphon off to Russia and to China," Trump said. Trump said he could abide by legislation ending US support for the Saudi-led war effort in Yemen, a proxy war with regional rival Iran that has led to a deepening humanitarian disaster. "Well, I'm much more open to Yemen because frankly, I hate to see what's going on in Yemen," Trump said. "But it takes two to tango. I'd want to see Iran pull out of Yemen too. Because - and I think they will."

Standing by Saudi crown prince despite pleas from Senate: Trump

*By:&nbsp;Gregory Brew

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries likes to look united.

That’s evident when OPEC leaders meet in Vienna at the end of each year to decide how much oil its members will aim to produce the next year. There is always a show of togetherness and the appearance of the quasi-cartel’s ability to move markets.

But the truth is, OPEC is in the midst of a major crisis made more evident by Qatar’s announcement that it would be leaving OPEC, partly to protest Saudi dominance over the group.

My research has taken me through the history of oil, particularly the relationship between oil revenues, economic development and the geopolitical balance of power in the 1960s and 1970s. I believe that rather than the arbiter of global energy, OPEC has often been held back by division, disagreement and divergent interests.

This weakness helps explain why OPEC has struggled to move markets in effective ways since the 2014 collapse of oil prices. The latest production cuts, which were bigger than expected but followed considerable acrimony, are further proof that OPEC’s disunity remains intact.

Early days: Divided and powerless

OPEC was formed from frustration. In the 1950s, the world was awash in oil as small nations in the Middle East and Latin America discovered enormous deposits.

To gain access to those deposits, the major oil companies, known as the “Seven Sisters,” signed concessionary agreements with local governments. This arrangement gave the companies control over the oil – they set production levels and prices – while governments simply collected a check.

In February 1959, amid an oil glut, the Seven Sisters decided that a price correction was necessary. Acting unilaterally, they cut the price of oil, from US$2.08 to $1.80 by August 1960.

That may sound odd today, but back then oil prices didn’t always follow market forces and were typically set by the companies.

The cuts meant a significant loss of revenue for the oil-producing states. In protest, the oil ministers of Iraq, Iran, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait met in Baghdad that September and formed OPEC to achieve a more equitable arrangement with the Seven Sisters. Algeria, Qatar, Indonesia and Libya joined later.

But the big oil exporters like Iran and Saudi Arabia could do little to coerce the companies. Oil was abundant, and the companies could successfully exclude any country from the market, as they did with Iran in 1951. OPEC did not possess enough market share or unity to pressure the companies into surrendering control over price.

A new balance of power

OPEC couldn’t agree on a consistent policy among its members. Saudi Arabia wanted to keep production levels low and prices consistent. Iran wanted prices pushed as high as possible in order to maximize revenue.

According to Ian Skeet, a scholar and an oil consultant, the shah of Iran sought a separate agreement that sabotaged an attempt to extract more favorable terms from the Seven Sisters in 1963.

During the 1960s, OPEC failed to form a united front.

Nevertheless, things were changing. Demand for oil shot up and US&nbsp;production stagnated. The Seven Sisters’ power was undermined by international competitors drilling new fields in North Africa, where Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi threatened to shut off supply if he didn’t get higher prices. Oil giants faced more pressure to deliver better terms to producing governments.

These conditions, while not the result of OPEC’s actions, gave it an opportunity to upset the balance of power.

Embargo, revolution and crisis 

This shift accelerated in the 1970s as war broke out between Israel and its Arab neighbors in October 1973.

To punish the US&nbsp;for supporting the Jewish state, Arab oil producers (not all OPEC members, as popularly believed) cut production and declared an embargo against the United States.

OPEC also demanded a higher oil price. After rejecting a small gesture from the Seven Sisters, OPEC announced it would double the price to $5 – then hiked it again to $11.65.

How did the balance of power seem to shift so suddenly? Among other reasons, oil companies could not agree among themselves on a new oil price and they were tempted by the big profits that would result. OPEC seized control of the market largely due to circumstances beyond its control.

Despite its victory, OPEC had come no closer to resolving its internal divisions. This became evident when the next energy crisis hit, in 1979, when Iran’s revolution broke out.

Global oil markets panicked. Iranian production fell. And other OPEC members sold their own oil at costly premiums, sending the price even higher.

Saudi Arabia tried to impose a quota system. Most members ignored their quotas or overproduced.

Meanwhile, oil-importing countries like the US&nbsp;and the UK&nbsp;sought improve fuel efficiency and invested in domestic oil production in places like Alaska the North Sea. By 1985, OPEC’s share of the global market had fallen below 30 percent.

By 1986, Saudi Arabia had had enough. Without warning, its production shot up by more than 2 million barrels per day, flooding the market and pushing the average price down to $18 per barrel, about $39 today, according to oil company records.

This move indicated Saudi willingness to use its massive reserves to “correct” the market and push out high-cost producers, even at the cost of its OPEC allies.

Russia's new role

As OPEC’s fortunes have oscillated with increasing volatility since the 1986 shock, cooperation has remained elusive.

In 2014, oil prices began to decline, due to increasing US&nbsp;production. To squeeze out American drillers, Saudi Arabia pumped more oil, sending prices to historic inflation-adjusted lows in early 2016.

But the move backfired: US&nbsp;producers held on, while OPEC members like Venezuela endured enormous economic pain.

To gain leverage, Saudi Arabia has partnered with Russia, a major oil exporter that doesn’t belong to OPEC, forming what some analysts have called OPEC+. The two countries now coordinate their production cuts to stabilize prices.

OPEC+ minus one 

Not all OPEC members are happy about this arrangement, including Qatar, a small Persian Gulf state. It has been at odds with Saudi Arabia since 2017. In December 2018, Qatar announced it would be leaving OPEC to concentrate on liquefied natural gas exports.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump was imploring OPEC to pump more oil rather than less of it, to keep gasoline prices low.

When OPEC+ met in Vienna it didn’t buckle. But the deal it reached followed considerable disagreement, which laid bare divisions within the group over how much oil output it should cut. In the end, Russia and Saudi Arabia agreed to do most of the cutting required to slash oil production by 1.2 million barrels per day. And Iran did not pledge any cuts at all.

The overall cut was bigger than expected. But Iran’s defiance, Qatar’s departure and the fight over cuts underscores what has been true from the very beginning: OPEC projects unity, but behind the scenes, the group struggles with division, disunity and differing interests.

*Gregory Brew is a Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Presidential History, Southern Methodist University.

This article was originally published on <a href="https://theconversation.com/us">The Conversation</a>. Read the&nbsp;<a href="https://theconversation.com/saudi-arabia-is-allying-with-russia-to-shore-up-oil-prices-as-opecs-power-wanes-108310">original article</a>)

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

*By: Gregory Brew The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries likes to look united. That’s evident when OPEC leaders meet in Vienna at the end of each year to decide how much oil its members will aim to produce the next year.

*By: Gregory Brew The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries likes to look united. That’s evident when OPEC leaders meet in Vienna at the end of each year to decide how much oil its members will aim to produce the next year. There is always a show of togetherness and the appearance of the quasi-cartel’s ability to move markets. But the truth is, OPEC is in the midst of a major crisis made more evident by Qatar’s announcement that it would be leaving OPEC, partly to protest Saudi dominance over the group. My research has taken me through the history of oil, particularly the relationship between oil revenues, economic development and the geopolitical balance of power in the 1960s and 1970s. I believe that rather than the arbiter of global energy, OPEC has often been held back by division, disagreement and divergent interests. This weakness helps explain why OPEC has struggled to move markets in effective ways since the 2014 collapse of oil prices. The latest production cuts, which were bigger than expected but followed considerable acrimony, are further proof that OPEC’s disunity remains intact. Early days: Divided and powerless OPEC was formed from frustration. In the 1950s, the world was awash in oil as small nations in the Middle East and Latin America discovered enormous deposits. To gain access to those deposits, the major oil companies, known as the “Seven Sisters,” signed concessionary agreements with local governments. This arrangement gave the companies control over the oil – they set production levels and prices – while governments simply collected a check. In February 1959, amid an oil glut, the Seven Sisters decided that a price correction was necessary. Acting unilaterally, they cut the price of oil, from US$2.08 to $1.80 by August 1960. That may sound odd today, but back then oil prices didn’t always follow market forces and were typically set by the companies. The cuts meant a significant loss of revenue for the oil-producing states. In protest, the oil ministers of Iraq, Iran, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait met in Baghdad that September and formed OPEC to achieve a more equitable arrangement with the Seven Sisters. Algeria, Qatar, Indonesia and Libya joined later. But the big oil exporters like Iran and Saudi Arabia could do little to coerce the companies. Oil was abundant, and the companies could successfully exclude any country from the market, as they did with Iran in 1951. OPEC did not possess enough market share or unity to pressure the companies into surrendering control over price. A new balance of power OPEC couldn’t agree on a consistent policy among its members. Saudi Arabia wanted to keep production levels low and prices consistent. Iran wanted prices pushed as high as possible in order to maximize revenue. According to Ian Skeet, a scholar and an oil consultant, the shah of Iran sought a separate agreement that sabotaged an attempt to extract more favorable terms from the Seven Sisters in 1963. During the 1960s, OPEC failed to form a united front. Nevertheless, things were changing. Demand for oil shot up and US production stagnated. The Seven Sisters’ power was undermined by international competitors drilling new fields in North Africa, where Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi threatened to shut off supply if he didn’t get higher prices. Oil giants faced more pressure to deliver better terms to producing governments. These conditions, while not the result of OPEC’s actions, gave it an opportunity to upset the balance of power. Embargo, revolution and crisis This shift accelerated in the 1970s as war broke out between Israel and its Arab neighbors in October 1973. To punish the US for supporting the Jewish state, Arab oil producers (not all OPEC members, as popularly believed) cut production and declared an embargo against the United States. OPEC also demanded a higher oil price. After rejecting a small gesture from the Seven Sisters, OPEC announced it would double the price to $5 – then hiked it again to $11.65. How did the balance of power seem to shift so suddenly? Among other reasons, oil companies could not agree among themselves on a new oil price and they were tempted by the big profits that would result. OPEC seized control of the market largely due to circumstances beyond its control. Despite its victory, OPEC had come no closer to resolving its internal divisions. This became evident when the next energy crisis hit, in 1979, when Iran’s revolution broke out. Global oil markets panicked. Iranian production fell. And other OPEC members sold their own oil at costly premiums, sending the price even higher. Saudi Arabia tried to impose a quota system. Most members ignored their quotas or overproduced. Meanwhile, oil-importing countries like the US and the UK sought improve fuel efficiency and invested in domestic oil production in places like Alaska the North Sea. By 1985, OPEC’s share of the global market had fallen below 30 percent. By 1986, Saudi Arabia had had enough. Without warning, its production shot up by more than 2 million barrels per day, flooding the market and pushing the average price down to $18 per barrel, about $39 today, according to oil company records. This move indicated Saudi willingness to use its massive reserves to “correct” the market and push out high-cost producers, even at the cost of its OPEC allies. Russia's new role As OPEC’s fortunes have oscillated with increasing volatility since the 1986 shock, cooperation has remained elusive. In 2014, oil prices began to decline, due to increasing US production. To squeeze out American drillers, Saudi Arabia pumped more oil, sending prices to historic inflation-adjusted lows in early 2016. But the move backfired: US producers held on, while OPEC members like Venezuela endured enormous economic pain. To gain leverage, Saudi Arabia has partnered with Russia, a major oil exporter that doesn’t belong to OPEC, forming what some analysts have called OPEC+. The two countries now coordinate their production cuts to stabilize prices. OPEC+ minus one Not all OPEC members are happy about this arrangement, including Qatar, a small Persian Gulf state. It has been at odds with Saudi Arabia since 2017. In December 2018, Qatar announced it would be leaving OPEC to concentrate on liquefied natural gas exports. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump was imploring OPEC to pump more oil rather than less of it, to keep gasoline prices low. When OPEC+ met in Vienna it didn’t buckle. But the deal it reached followed considerable disagreement, which laid bare divisions within the group over how much oil output it should cut. In the end, Russia and Saudi Arabia agreed to do most of the cutting required to slash oil production by 1.2 million barrels per day. And Iran did not pledge any cuts at all. The overall cut was bigger than expected. But Iran’s defiance, Qatar’s departure and the fight over cuts underscores what has been true from the very beginning: OPEC projects unity, but behind the scenes, the group struggles with division, disunity and differing interests. *Gregory Brew is a Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Presidential History, Southern Methodist University. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article) (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

Saudi Arabia is allying with Russia to shore up oil prices as OPEC's power wanes

The Gulf Cooperation Council's (GCC) annual summit was set to open in Riyadh on Sunday, with regional unity imperilled by a bitter row with Qatar and the host, Saudi Arabia, facing a diplomatic crisis over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The one-day annual gathering of leaders from the six member states is expected to focus on security issues, including the Yemen war and Iran's regional activities, and may touch on oil politics and a protracted boycott of Qatar by some of its neighbours.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and non-GCC member Egypt cut diplomatic and economic ties with Qatar in June 2017 over allegations of supporting terrorism.&nbsp;

Qatar, which last week abruptly announced it was withdrawing from oil exporters group OPEC, denies the charges and says the boycott aims to curtail its sovereignty.

The Saudi king has invited Qatar`s emir to the summit, but Doha has not said what level of representation it would send. The emir attended last year`s gathering in Kuwait, while Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain sent more junior officials.

The GCC -- set up in 1980 as a bulwark against larger neighbours Iran and Iraq -- groups Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait, whose ties with Riyadh have also been strained over control of shared oilfields.

Saudi Arabia has resisted renewed US pressure to end the Qatar row after the October 2 murder of Khashoggi at the kingdom's Istanbul consulate drew global condemnation and exposed Riyadh`s domestic crackdown on dissent and activities in the region.

Rights group Amnesty International called on GCC states to release peaceful dissidents in the region, where governments have shown little tolerance for open dissent or criticism of rulers.

"Gulf leaders can no longer operate on the assumption that they have a carte blanche to treat their citizens like criminals whenever they express dissent without fear of any international repercussions," said Heba Morayef, Middle East Director of Campaigns.

The United States has increased pressure on Riyadh following Kashoggi's killing to end the Yemen war and mend fences with Qatar as Washington wants Gulf states to present a united front against Iran.

Qatar's exit from OPEC after 57 year to focus on gas appeared to be a swipe at the bloc's de facto leader Saudi Arabia. The move has deepened the sense among diplomats and analysts that any prospect for a near-term resolution to the dispute was unlikely at the Riyadh summit.

While the boycotting states have said the row is not a priority for them and that the GCC remained valid, Doha has said the dispute harmed regional security by weakening the bloc.

Relations have also soured between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait over oil production from two jointly-run oilfields in the so-called Neutral Zone after talks in September failed to move the two countries closer to a deal.

The Gulf Cooperation Council's (GCC) annual summit was set to open in Riyadh on Sunday, with regional unity imperilled by a bitter row with Qatar and the host, Saudi Arabia, facing a diplomatic crisis over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The Gulf Cooperation Council's (GCC) annual summit was set to open in Riyadh on Sunday, with regional unity imperilled by a bitter row with Qatar and the host, Saudi Arabia, facing a diplomatic crisis over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The one-day annual gathering of leaders from the six member states is expected to focus on security issues, including the Yemen war and Iran's regional activities, and may touch on oil politics and a protracted boycott of Qatar by some of its neighbours. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and non-GCC member Egypt cut diplomatic and economic ties with Qatar in June 2017 over allegations of supporting terrorism. Qatar, which last week abruptly announced it was withdrawing from oil exporters group OPEC, denies the charges and says the boycott aims to curtail its sovereignty. The Saudi king has invited Qatar`s emir to the summit, but Doha has not said what level of representation it would send. The emir attended last year`s gathering in Kuwait, while Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain sent more junior officials. The GCC -- set up in 1980 as a bulwark against larger neighbours Iran and Iraq -- groups Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait, whose ties with Riyadh have also been strained over control of shared oilfields. Saudi Arabia has resisted renewed US pressure to end the Qatar row after the October 2 murder of Khashoggi at the kingdom's Istanbul consulate drew global condemnation and exposed Riyadh`s domestic crackdown on dissent and activities in the region. Rights group Amnesty International called on GCC states to release peaceful dissidents in the region, where governments have shown little tolerance for open dissent or criticism of rulers. "Gulf leaders can no longer operate on the assumption that they have a carte blanche to treat their citizens like criminals whenever they express dissent without fear of any international repercussions," said Heba Morayef, Middle East Director of Campaigns. The United States has increased pressure on Riyadh following Kashoggi's killing to end the Yemen war and mend fences with Qatar as Washington wants Gulf states to present a united front against Iran. Qatar's exit from OPEC after 57 year to focus on gas appeared to be a swipe at the bloc's de facto leader Saudi Arabia. The move has deepened the sense among diplomats and analysts that any prospect for a near-term resolution to the dispute was unlikely at the Riyadh summit. While the boycotting states have said the row is not a priority for them and that the GCC remained valid, Doha has said the dispute harmed regional security by weakening the bloc. Relations have also soured between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait over oil production from two jointly-run oilfields in the so-called Neutral Zone after talks in September failed to move the two countries closer to a deal.

Saudi Arabia hosts GCC summit amid Qatar tensions, Khashoggi crisis

OPEC to consider PM Modi's call before taking decision

Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker Sean Penn has reportedly started working on a documentary about the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul earlier this year which led worldwide protests.&nbsp; 
 
Penn, along with a crew of 10 people, was spotted shooting in front of the Suadi consulate building in Istanbul on Wednesday, Turkish media reported. Penn later also was seen outside the consul general's residence nearby.&nbsp; 
 
Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post and a US resident since 2017, was killed during his visit to the consulate to obtain marriage-related paperwork on October 2. 
Despite massive searches, the whereabouts of his searches are still unknown.&nbsp; 
 
In an image circulated by a Turkish daily, Penn can be seen outside the mission where the <a href="https://www.wionews.com/videos/khashoggi-fiancee-riyadh-responsible-for-his-murder-must-explain-174373">Saudi writer was strangled.</a> He was later cut up into pieces by a 15-man Saudi team especially sent to Istanbul for the task. 
 
Khashoggi was a vocal critic of the Saudi government and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and his murder led to a massive international outcry and forced many countries to reassess their ties with the kingdom. 
 
While initially, the Saudi government denied any involvement with his disappearance, Riyadh eventually admitted last month that Saudi officials had planned and executed the killing, blaming a "rogue" team.&nbsp; 
 
The <a href="http://www.wionews.com/videos/khashoggi-murder-cia-says-that-arab-crown-prince-ordered-the-killing-181584">CIA has reportedly assessed that Prince Mohammed,</a> also known as MBS, ordered the killing of Khashoggi.

21 people, including security officers, have been arrested in Saudi Arabia in connection with the killing.

Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker Sean Penn has reportedly started working on a documentary about the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul earlier this year which led worldwide protests.

Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker Sean Penn has reportedly started working on a documentary about the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul earlier this year which led worldwide protests. Penn, along with a crew of 10 people, was spotted shooting in front of the Suadi consulate building in Istanbul on Wednesday, Turkish media reported. Penn later also was seen outside the consul general's residence nearby. Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post and a US resident since 2017, was killed during his visit to the consulate to obtain marriage-related paperwork on October 2. Despite massive searches, the whereabouts of his searches are still unknown. In an image circulated by a Turkish daily, Penn can be seen outside the mission where the Saudi writer was strangled. He was later cut up into pieces by a 15-man Saudi team especially sent to Istanbul for the task. Khashoggi was a vocal critic of the Saudi government and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and his murder led to a massive international outcry and forced many countries to reassess their ties with the kingdom. While initially, the Saudi government denied any involvement with his disappearance, Riyadh eventually admitted last month that Saudi officials had planned and executed the killing, blaming a "rogue" team. The CIA has reportedly assessed that Prince Mohammed, also known as MBS, ordered the killing of Khashoggi. 21 people, including security officers, have been arrested in Saudi Arabia in connection with the killing.

Sean Penn making a film on Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder?

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/us-not-in-a-position-to-tell-us-what-to-do-says-saudi-arabia-on-oil-price-cut-181971">US</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/us-not-in-a-position-to-tell-us-what-to-do-says-saudi-arabia-on-oil-price-cut-181971"> not in a position to tell us what to </a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/us-not-in-a-position-to-tell-us-what-to-do-says-saudi-arabia-on-oil-price-cut-181971">do,</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/us-not-in-a-position-to-tell-us-what-to-do-says-saudi-arabia-on-oil-price-cut-181971"> says Saudi Arabia on oil price cut</a>

In a move aimed at President Trump, Saudi Arabia's oil minister said the US should not try to dictate policy to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries OPEC.

President Trump in a tweet on Wednesday had said the world does not want to see, or need higher oil prices.&nbsp;

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/india-news/kartarpur-corridor-long-standing-demand-of-sikhs-unfortunate-pak-tried-to-politicise-religious-issue-india-181940">Kartarpur corridor </a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/india-news/kartarpur-corridor-long-standing-demand-of-sikhs-unfortunate-pak-tried-to-politicise-religious-issue-india-181940">long standing</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/india-news/kartarpur-corridor-long-standing-demand-of-sikhs-unfortunate-pak-tried-to-politicise-religious-issue-india-181940"> demand of Sikhs, unfortunate Pak tried to politicise religious issue: India</a>

India's ministry of external affairs(MEA) said today that India's protocol officers were denied entry for the Kartarpur ceremony.

"We see it as the fulfilment of the long-standing demand of the Sikh community. It is unfortunate that Pakistan attempted to politicised a religious issue," MEA spokesman Raveesh Kumar said.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/perpetrators-involved-in-chabahar-terror-attack-should-be-brought-to-justice-india-181926">Perpetrators involved in Chabahar terror attack should be brought to justice: India</a>

India today condemned the suicide attack on the Chabahar port in southeastern Iran in which at least three people were killed and several others were injured.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/china-urges-immediate-release-of-huawei-cfo-meng-wanzhou-181949">China urges </a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/china-urges-immediate-release-of-huawei-cfo-meng-wanzhou-181949">immediate</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/china-urges-immediate-release-of-huawei-cfo-meng-wanzhou-181949"> release of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou&nbsp;</a>

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday firmly opposed the arrest of Huawei's chief financial officer in Vancouver, Canada and urged an immediate release of her.

Geng Shuang, spokesman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, made the remarks at a regular press briefing in Beijing. Huawei's CFO Meng Wanzhou was detained in Canada at the request of the United States and the US is seeking her extradition.

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/can-uk-renounce-brexit-eu-court-decides-monday-181916">Can </a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/can-uk-renounce-brexit-eu-court-decides-monday-181916">UK</a><a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/can-uk-renounce-brexit-eu-court-decides-monday-181916"> renounce Brexit? EU court to decide on Monday</a>

The European Court of Justice is expected to announce on Monday whether or not Britain can unilaterally halt its march towards Brexit, a day before a make-or-break vote by MPs on the divorce deal.

US not in a position to tell us what to do, says Saudi Arabia on oil price cut In a move aimed at President Trump, Saudi Arabia's oil minister said the US should not try to dictate policy to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries OPEC.

US not in a position to tell us what to do, says Saudi Arabia on oil price cut In a move aimed at President Trump, Saudi Arabia's oil minister said the US should not try to dictate policy to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries OPEC. President Trump in a tweet on Wednesday had said the world does not want to see, or need higher oil prices. Kartarpur corridor long standing demand of Sikhs, unfortunate Pak tried to politicise religious issue: India India's ministry of external affairs(MEA) said today that India's protocol officers were denied entry for the Kartarpur ceremony. "We see it as the fulfilment of the long-standing demand of the Sikh community. It is unfortunate that Pakistan attempted to politicised a religious issue," MEA spokesman Raveesh Kumar said. Perpetrators involved in Chabahar terror attack should be brought to justice: India India today condemned the suicide attack on the Chabahar port in southeastern Iran in which at least three people were killed and several others were injured. China urges immediate release of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday firmly opposed the arrest of Huawei's chief financial officer in Vancouver, Canada and urged an immediate release of her. Geng Shuang, spokesman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, made the remarks at a regular press briefing in Beijing. Huawei's CFO Meng Wanzhou was detained in Canada at the request of the United States and the US is seeking her extradition. Can UK renounce Brexit? EU court to decide on Monday The European Court of Justice is expected to announce on Monday whether or not Britain can unilaterally halt its march towards Brexit, a day before a make-or-break vote by MPs on the divorce deal.

A draft US Senate resolution effectively portraying Saudi policy as detrimental to US interests and values and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as “complicit” in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, if adopted and implemented, potentially could change the dynamics of the region's politics and create an initial exit from almost a decade of mayhem, conflict and bloodshed.

The six-page draft also holds Prince Mohammed accountable for the devastating war in Yemen that has sparked one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, the failure to end the 17-month-old Saudi-United Arab Emirates-led economic and diplomatic boycott of Qatar, and the jailing and torture of Saudi dissidents and activists.

In doing so, the resolution confronts not only Prince Mohammed's policies but also by implication those of his closest ally, UAE crown prince Mohammed bin Zayed. The UAE was the first country that Saudi leader visited after the Khashoggi killing.

By in effect challenging the position of king-in-waiting Prince Mohammed, the resolution raises the question whether some of his closest allies, including the UAE crown prince, will in future want to be identified that closely with him.

Moreover, by demanding the release of activist Raif bin Muhammad Badawi, better known as Raif Badawi, and women's rights activists, the resolution further the challenges fundamentals of Prince Mohammed's iron-fisted repression of his critics, the extent of his proposed social reforms as part of his drive to diversify and streamline the Saudi economy, and the kingdom's human rights record.

A 34-year-old blogger who named his website Free Saudi Liberals, Badawi was barred from travel and had his assets frozen in 2009, arrested in 2012, and sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for insulting Islam. His sister, Samar Badawi, a women’s rights activist, was detained earlier this year. Badawi’s wife and children were granted asylum and citizenship in Canada.

A diplomatic row that stunned many erupted in August when Saudi Arabia expelled the Canadian ambassador after the foreign ministry in Ottawa demanded in a tweet the release of Badawi and other activists.

Prince Mohammed and Saudi Arabia, even prior to the introduction of the Senate resolution, were discovering that the Khashoggi killing had weakened the kingdom internationally and had made it more vulnerable to pressure.

Talks in Sweden between the Saudi-backed Yemeni government and Houthi rebels to end the war is the most immediate consequence of the kingdom's changing position.

So is the resolution that is unprecedented in the scope and harshness of the criticism of a long-standing ally.&nbsp;

While the resolution is likely to spark initial anger among some of Prince's Mohammed's allies, it nevertheless, if adopted and/or implemented, could persuade some like UAE crown prince Mohammed to rethink their fundamental strategies.

The relationship between the two Mohammeds constituted a cornerstone of the UAE leader's strategy to achieve his political, foreign policy and defence goals.

These include projecting the Emirates as a guiding light of cutting-edge Arab and Muslim modernity; ensuring that the Middle East fits the crown prince's autocratic, anti-Islamist mould; and enabling the UAE, described by US defence secretary Jim Mattis as 'Little Sparta,' to punch above its weight politically, diplomatically and militarily.

To compensate for the Emirates’ small size, Prince Mohammed opted to pursue his goals in part by working through the Saudi royal court. In leaked emails, UAE ambassador to Washington Yousef al-Otaiba, a close associate of Prince Mohammed, said of the Saudi crown prince that

“I don’t think we’ll ever see a more pragmatic leader in that country.”

Al-Otaiba went on to say: “I think in the long term we might be a good influence on KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia), at least with certain people there. Our relationship with them is based on strategic depth, shared interests, and most importantly the hope that we could influence them. Not the other way around.”

The impact of the Senate resolution and what it means for the US policy will to a large extent depend on the politics of the differences between the Congress and President Donald J Trump who has so far sought to shield the Saudi crown prince.

To further do so, Trump, with or without the resolution, would likely have to pressure Saudi Arabia to give him something tangible to work with such as an immediate release of imprisoned activists followed by a resolution of the Qatar crisis as well as some indication that the Yemen peace negotiations are progressing.

Whichever way, the fallout of the Khashoggi killing, culminating in unprecedented Congressional anger against Prince Mohammed and the kingdom, is likely to have significant consequences not only for the Saudi crown prince but potentially also for the strategy of his UAE counterpart.

That in turn could create light at the end of the Middle East's tunnel of almost a decade of volatility and violent and bloody conflict that has been driven by Saudi and UAE assertiveness in countering dissent at home and abroad in the wake of the 2011 popular Arab revolts as well as Iran that has played its part in countries like Syria and Yemen in fuelling destruction and bloodshed.

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

A draft US Senate resolution effectively portraying Saudi policy as detrimental to US interests and values and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as “complicit” in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, if adopted and implemented, potentially could change the dynamics of the region's politics and create an initial exit from almost a decade of mayhem, conflict and bloodshed.

A draft US Senate resolution effectively portraying Saudi policy as detrimental to US interests and values and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as “complicit” in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, if adopted and implemented, potentially could change the dynamics of the region's politics and create an initial exit from almost a decade of mayhem, conflict and bloodshed. The six-page draft also holds Prince Mohammed accountable for the devastating war in Yemen that has sparked one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, the failure to end the 17-month-old Saudi-United Arab Emirates-led economic and diplomatic boycott of Qatar, and the jailing and torture of Saudi dissidents and activists. In doing so, the resolution confronts not only Prince Mohammed's policies but also by implication those of his closest ally, UAE crown prince Mohammed bin Zayed. The UAE was the first country that Saudi leader visited after the Khashoggi killing. By in effect challenging the position of king-in-waiting Prince Mohammed, the resolution raises the question whether some of his closest allies, including the UAE crown prince, will in future want to be identified that closely with him. Moreover, by demanding the release of activist Raif bin Muhammad Badawi, better known as Raif Badawi, and women's rights activists, the resolution further the challenges fundamentals of Prince Mohammed's iron-fisted repression of his critics, the extent of his proposed social reforms as part of his drive to diversify and streamline the Saudi economy, and the kingdom's human rights record. A 34-year-old blogger who named his website Free Saudi Liberals, Badawi was barred from travel and had his assets frozen in 2009, arrested in 2012, and sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes for insulting Islam. His sister, Samar Badawi, a women’s rights activist, was detained earlier this year. Badawi’s wife and children were granted asylum and citizenship in Canada. A diplomatic row that stunned many erupted in August when Saudi Arabia expelled the Canadian ambassador after the foreign ministry in Ottawa demanded in a tweet the release of Badawi and other activists. Prince Mohammed and Saudi Arabia, even prior to the introduction of the Senate resolution, were discovering that the Khashoggi killing had weakened the kingdom internationally and had made it more vulnerable to pressure. Talks in Sweden between the Saudi-backed Yemeni government and Houthi rebels to end the war is the most immediate consequence of the kingdom's changing position. So is the resolution that is unprecedented in the scope and harshness of the criticism of a long-standing ally. While the resolution is likely to spark initial anger among some of Prince's Mohammed's allies, it nevertheless, if adopted and/or implemented, could persuade some like UAE crown prince Mohammed to rethink their fundamental strategies. The relationship between the two Mohammeds constituted a cornerstone of the UAE leader's strategy to achieve his political, foreign policy and defence goals. These include projecting the Emirates as a guiding light of cutting-edge Arab and Muslim modernity; ensuring that the Middle East fits the crown prince's autocratic, anti-Islamist mould; and enabling the UAE, described by US defence secretary Jim Mattis as 'Little Sparta,' to punch above its weight politically, diplomatically and militarily. To compensate for the Emirates’ small size, Prince Mohammed opted to pursue his goals in part by working through the Saudi royal court. In leaked emails, UAE ambassador to Washington Yousef al-Otaiba, a close associate of Prince Mohammed, said of the Saudi crown prince that “I don’t think we’ll ever see a more pragmatic leader in that country.” Al-Otaiba went on to say: “I think in the long term we might be a good influence on KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia), at least with certain people there. Our relationship with them is based on strategic depth, shared interests, and most importantly the hope that we could influence them. Not the other way around.” The impact of the Senate resolution and what it means for the US policy will to a large extent depend on the politics of the differences between the Congress and President Donald J Trump who has so far sought to shield the Saudi crown prince. To further do so, Trump, with or without the resolution, would likely have to pressure Saudi Arabia to give him something tangible to work with such as an immediate release of imprisoned activists followed by a resolution of the Qatar crisis as well as some indication that the Yemen peace negotiations are progressing. Whichever way, the fallout of the Khashoggi killing, culminating in unprecedented Congressional anger against Prince Mohammed and the kingdom, is likely to have significant consequences not only for the Saudi crown prince but potentially also for the strategy of his UAE counterpart. That in turn could create light at the end of the Middle East's tunnel of almost a decade of volatility and violent and bloody conflict that has been driven by Saudi and UAE assertiveness in countering dissent at home and abroad in the wake of the 2011 popular Arab revolts as well as Iran that has played its part in countries like Syria and Yemen in fuelling destruction and bloodshed. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

US Senate resolution potentially changes Middle East dynamics

Senior US senators said on Tuesday they were more certain than ever that<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/saudi-crown-prince-was-in-constant-touch-with-khashoggi-kill-team-wsj-181054"> Saudi Arabia`s crown prince</a>, Mohammed bin Salman, was responsible for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi after receiving a CIA briefing on the matter.

"You have to be willfully blind not to come to the conclusion that this was orchestrated and organised by people under the command of <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/saudi-crown-prince-sidelined-in-g20-family-photo-180611">MbS</a>," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham told reporters after the meeting with Central Intelligence Agency Director Gina Haspel, referring to the crown prince by his initials.&nbsp;

In his bid to pressure the Trump administration to condemn the crown prince, Graham, who has become one of the president`s most vocal allies, said there may not be a "smoking gun," but that there was a "smoking saw," a reference to a bone saw that investigators said was used to cut up Khashoggi`s body.&nbsp;

Making some of their strongest accusations so far, both Republicans and Democrats said they still want to pass legislation to send a message to Saudi Arabia that the United States condemns the death of Khashoggi. But they remain sharply divided over how to do so.

Many Democrats want a "straight up or down vote" on a war powers resolution to end all US support for the Saudi coalition in Yemen, without amendments.

But President Donald Trump and some of his fellow Republicans have argued that Washington should not take action that would risk its relationship with Riyadh, which is viewed as an important counterweight to Iran in the Middle East.

"Somebody should be punished," Republican Senator Richard Shelby said. "Now the question is how do you separate the Saudi crown prince and his group from the nation itself?"

Last week, 14 of Trump`s fellow Republicans, who hold a slim majority in the Senate and rarely break from the president, defied his wishes and voted with Democrats to advance the measure that would end US support for the Saudi-led war effort in Yemen.

The unusual vote last week came shortly after a briefing by Trump`s Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who urged lawmakers not to do anything to undermine the<a href="http://www.wionews.com/opinions/khashoggi-crisis-reshaping-us-politics-and-relations-with-saudi-arabia-178498"> US-Saudi relationship</a>.

Haspel`s absence from that briefing angered senators.

Graham said he would not vote for the Yemen resolution. He said he would prefer to pass a separate bill to cut off arms sales to Saudi Arabia, military aid for the war in Yemen and impose sanctions on those responsible for individuals responsible for human rights abuses.

Graham introduced a bill setting out those goals last month. Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, another lead sponsor of the legislation, told reporters after the Haspel briefing that he might try to get it passed as an amendment to a must-pass spending bill if the Senate does not pass the war powers resolution.

Both Republicans and Democrats urged Trump himself to strongly condemn the killing after he stood by the crown prince.

"If the crown prince went in front of a jury, he`d be convicted in 30 minutes," said Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Asked if he would be convicted of murder, Corker replied "Yes."

The senators spoke to reporters as they left the closed-door briefing for some Senate committee leaders and Senate leaders by CIA Director Haspel.&nbsp;

"Before this briefing, I was convinced that we had to take steps on the war in Yemen and I believe that we had to take steps on the Saudis,” Menendez said. "I am only solidified in that view after this briefing. It is my hope that the Senate will act and send a strong, unequivocal message that such actions cannot stand and I believe that my legislation with Senator Graham is the appropriate response."

Corker shook his head no, when asked if he thought Haspel`s Senate briefing on Tuesday had changed any minds.

Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October.

Senators acknowledged there are still deep divides between the two parties on how to proceed.

Corker said it would be "difficult" to come up with legislation that could pass the Senate. He said he was working with colleagues on how to amend the resolution, and he had not had suggestions from the Trump administration on how it might prefer to proceed.

Senior US senators said on Tuesday they were more certain than ever that Saudi Arabia`s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was responsible for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi after receiving a CIA briefing on the matter.

Senior US senators said on Tuesday they were more certain than ever that Saudi Arabia`s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was responsible for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi after receiving a CIA briefing on the matter. "You have to be willfully blind not to come to the conclusion that this was orchestrated and organised by people under the command of MbS," Republican Senator Lindsey Graham told reporters after the meeting with Central Intelligence Agency Director Gina Haspel, referring to the crown prince by his initials. In his bid to pressure the Trump administration to condemn the crown prince, Graham, who has become one of the president`s most vocal allies, said there may not be a "smoking gun," but that there was a "smoking saw," a reference to a bone saw that investigators said was used to cut up Khashoggi`s body. Making some of their strongest accusations so far, both Republicans and Democrats said they still want to pass legislation to send a message to Saudi Arabia that the United States condemns the death of Khashoggi. But they remain sharply divided over how to do so. Many Democrats want a "straight up or down vote" on a war powers resolution to end all US support for the Saudi coalition in Yemen, without amendments. But President Donald Trump and some of his fellow Republicans have argued that Washington should not take action that would risk its relationship with Riyadh, which is viewed as an important counterweight to Iran in the Middle East. "Somebody should be punished," Republican Senator Richard Shelby said. "Now the question is how do you separate the Saudi crown prince and his group from the nation itself?" Last week, 14 of Trump`s fellow Republicans, who hold a slim majority in the Senate and rarely break from the president, defied his wishes and voted with Democrats to advance the measure that would end US support for the Saudi-led war effort in Yemen. The unusual vote last week came shortly after a briefing by Trump`s Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who urged lawmakers not to do anything to undermine the US-Saudi relationship. Haspel`s absence from that briefing angered senators. Graham said he would not vote for the Yemen resolution. He said he would prefer to pass a separate bill to cut off arms sales to Saudi Arabia, military aid for the war in Yemen and impose sanctions on those responsible for individuals responsible for human rights abuses. Graham introduced a bill setting out those goals last month. Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, another lead sponsor of the legislation, told reporters after the Haspel briefing that he might try to get it passed as an amendment to a must-pass spending bill if the Senate does not pass the war powers resolution. Both Republicans and Democrats urged Trump himself to strongly condemn the killing after he stood by the crown prince. "If the crown prince went in front of a jury, he`d be convicted in 30 minutes," said Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Asked if he would be convicted of murder, Corker replied "Yes." The senators spoke to reporters as they left the closed-door briefing for some Senate committee leaders and Senate leaders by CIA Director Haspel. "Before this briefing, I was convinced that we had to take steps on the war in Yemen and I believe that we had to take steps on the Saudis,” Menendez said. "I am only solidified in that view after this briefing. It is my hope that the Senate will act and send a strong, unequivocal message that such actions cannot stand and I believe that my legislation with Senator Graham is the appropriate response." Corker shook his head no, when asked if he thought Haspel`s Senate briefing on Tuesday had changed any minds. Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. Senators acknowledged there are still deep divides between the two parties on how to proceed. Corker said it would be "difficult" to come up with legislation that could pass the Senate. He said he was working with colleagues on how to amend the resolution, and he had not had suggestions from the Trump administration on how it might prefer to proceed.

Saudi Crown Prince Salman ordered Khashoggi killing: US senators

Turkey on Wednesday said Saudi Arabia needed to be transparent with the international community about the investigation into the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and that Ankara would willingly take part in an international probe.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu made the comments to reporters while on a visit to Brussels.&nbsp;

The United Nations human rights chief on Wednesday called for an international investigation to determine who was responsible for the murder of the Saudi journalist in Istanbul two months ago.

Khashoggi, a US resident, was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on October 2. After initially denying the murder, Riyadh has acknowledged that Khashoggi was killed inside the consulate but blamed his death on a "rogue" operation.

The Saudis have charged 11 people in the case.

Turkey on Wednesday said Saudi Arabia needed to be transparent with the international community about the investigation into the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and that Ankara would willingly take part in an international probe.

Turkey on Wednesday said Saudi Arabia needed to be transparent with the international community about the investigation into the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, and that Ankara would willingly take part in an international probe. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu made the comments to reporters while on a visit to Brussels. The United Nations human rights chief on Wednesday called for an international investigation to determine who was responsible for the murder of the Saudi journalist in Istanbul two months ago. Khashoggi, a US resident, was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on October 2. After initially denying the murder, Riyadh has acknowledged that Khashoggi was killed inside the consulate but blamed his death on a "rogue" operation. The Saudis have charged 11 people in the case.

Turkey calls for Saudi Arabia to be transparent on Khashoggi investigation

Saudi Arabia is seeking to persuade Russia on Wednesday to cut oil production substantially with OPEC next year in an attempt to arrest a decline in the price of crude and prevent another global glut.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak was due later in the day to meet his Saudi counterpart Khalid al-Falih, whose country leads the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

OPEC holds policy talks on Thursday in Vienna, followed by a gathering with allies including Russia on Friday.

Saudi Arabia has indicated it wants OPEC and its allies to cut output by at least 1.3 million barrels per day, or 1.3 per cent of global production.

Riyadh wants Moscow to contribute at least 250,000-300,000 bpd to the cut but Russia insists the amount should be only half of that, OPEC and non-OPEC sources said.

"It is not easy but we will always work together with our colleagues," United Arab Emirates Energy Minister Suhail bin Mohammed al-Mazroui told reporters when asked about Russia's position.

A source close to the Russian Energy Ministry said: "No one is eager to cut unless there is an emergency. It is the United States where we are seeing the bulk of the increase in oil output. OPEC and Russia will be very careful about voluntary 'blood letting'."

Russia, Saudi Arabia and the United States have been vying for the position of top crude producer in recent years. The United States is not part of any output-limiting initiative due to its strict anti-trust legislation and fragmented oil industry.

Crude prices have sunk since October due to global economic weakness and fears of a glut due largely to rising US production.

Saudi Arabia is seeking to persuade Russia on Wednesday to cut oil production substantially with OPEC next year in an attempt to arrest a decline in the price of crude and prevent another global glut.

Saudi Arabia is seeking to persuade Russia on Wednesday to cut oil production substantially with OPEC next year in an attempt to arrest a decline in the price of crude and prevent another global glut. Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak was due later in the day to meet his Saudi counterpart Khalid al-Falih, whose country leads the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. OPEC holds policy talks on Thursday in Vienna, followed by a gathering with allies including Russia on Friday. Saudi Arabia has indicated it wants OPEC and its allies to cut output by at least 1.3 million barrels per day, or 1.3 per cent of global production. Riyadh wants Moscow to contribute at least 250,000-300,000 bpd to the cut but Russia insists the amount should be only half of that, OPEC and non-OPEC sources said. "It is not easy but we will always work together with our colleagues," United Arab Emirates Energy Minister Suhail bin Mohammed al-Mazroui told reporters when asked about Russia's position. A source close to the Russian Energy Ministry said: "No one is eager to cut unless there is an emergency. It is the United States where we are seeing the bulk of the increase in oil output. OPEC and Russia will be very careful about voluntary 'blood letting'." Russia, Saudi Arabia and the United States have been vying for the position of top crude producer in recent years. The United States is not part of any output-limiting initiative due to its strict anti-trust legislation and fragmented oil industry. Crude prices have sunk since October due to global economic weakness and fears of a glut due largely to rising US production.

Saudi Arabia works on convincing Russia to join oil cuts

The Turkish prosecutors have sought the arrest of two Saudi crown prince allies over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

A day before Senior US senators had expressed their certainty over the involvement of Saudi crown prince in the killing of Jamal Khashoggi.

The Senators had said they were more certain than ever that Saudi Arabia`s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was responsible for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi after receiving a CIA briefing on the matter.

Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October.

After repeated denials, Saudi Arabia finally admitted in mid-October that Khashoggi had been murdered at the compound, but blamed it on a "rogue" operation.

The journalist died after being drugged and then dismembered, a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office said in the first Saudi confirmation of how he was killed.

The journalist's body parts were then handed over to an agent outside the consulate grounds, the spokesman said.

(With inputs from agencies)

The Turkish prosecutors have sought the arrest of two Saudi crown prince allies over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. A day before Senior US senators had expressed their certainty over the involvement of Saudi crown prince in the killing of Jamal Khashoggi.

The Turkish prosecutors have sought the arrest of two Saudi crown prince allies over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. A day before Senior US senators had expressed their certainty over the involvement of Saudi crown prince in the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. The Senators had said they were more certain than ever that Saudi Arabia`s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was responsible for the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi after receiving a CIA briefing on the matter. Khashoggi, a US resident who was a columnist for the Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. After repeated denials, Saudi Arabia finally admitted in mid-October that Khashoggi had been murdered at the compound, but blamed it on a "rogue" operation. The journalist died after being drugged and then dismembered, a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office said in the first Saudi confirmation of how he was killed. The journalist's body parts were then handed over to an agent outside the consulate grounds, the spokesman said. (With inputs from agencies)

Turkish prosecutors say seek arrest of two Saudi crown prince allies over Khashoggi murder

Kremlin defends Putin-Saudi Crown prince high-five

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded Saturday that Saudi Arabia extradite suspects in the killing in Istanbul of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, taking to task the kingdom's crown prince who was basking in his quick return to the world stage at the G20.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's presence at the summit of the Group of 20 powers in Buenos Aires demonstrated he was firmly in control, as he met with Western leaders and sealed an oil pact with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

But the Turkish leader, also attending the G20, was visibly cooler toward the 33-year-old prince and on Saturday directly criticized him for the first time over the killing of Khashoggi, a royal confidant turned critic.

Saudi Arabia has said that 21 people are in custody and vowed to keep probing the killing of Khashoggi, who was killed and dismembered after visiting the kingdom's Istanbul consulate to handle paperwork for his planned wedding.&nbsp;

"It's essential that these people are tried in Turkey in order to eliminate any question marks that the international community may have," Erdogan told reporters in Buenos Aires.

"Whoever has ordered and implemented this violent crime should be found out at once. Unless the perpetrators are found out, the whole world and the Islamic community shall not be satisfied."

Erdogan said the Saudis have refused to help Turkish prosecutors with information on the whereabouts of Khashoggi's body and the identities of accomplices said to have supported the visiting Saudi hit squad.

The Islamist-oriented Turkish leader, who has been vying for influence in the region with Saudi Arabia, said he did "not wish to cause any damage" to the royal family.

But he criticized Prince Mohammed, saying that during the summit the Saudi heir apparent gave an "unbelievable explanation" on Khashoggi's killing.

The prince told world leaders that "unless the crime is proven, you cannot blame Saudi Arabia," Erdogan quoted him as saying.

"Of course, that might be valid from a legal point of view," Erdogan said. "But his own officials have admitted that this was a planned operation."

Only Canada raises case

Erdogan said that only one G20 leader -- Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau -- raised the journalist's killing in the full summit.

Erdogan said that he himself did not bring up the case as time ran out in the session.

Both French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Theresa May said they raised the Khashoggi case during private meetings with the crown prince, with Macron overheard on an open microphone telling him, "You never listen to me."

Canada has been outspoken on human rights in Saudi Arabia, which has retaliated by breaking off diplomatic relations and vowing to end trade.

But US President Donald Trump has said that it does not matter if the crown prince ordered the killing of Khashoggi, who lived near Washington because the kingdom is a major buyer of arms, supplier of oil and opponent of Iran.

In a nod to growing criticism at home on Saudi Arabia, Trump only exchanged "pleasantries" with the crown prince, according to the White House.

But Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with his Saudi counterpart in Buenos Aires, and again defended the US embrace of the crown prince.

"There's no direct evidence linking him to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi," Pompeo told CNN.&nbsp;

Reports implicate prince

Several US news reports say that the CIA has concluded that the crown prince ordered the killing, even if there is no "smoking gun" evidence.

The Wall Street Journal, quoting the CIA assessment, said Saturday that Prince Mohammed sent at least 11 messages in the hours before the killing to a close adviser charged with overseeing the murder.

The crown prince enjoyed a buoyant welcome at the G20 on Friday from Putin, the two exchanging a high-five and grinning broadly as if they were long-lost friends.

Putin said he had agreed with Prince Mohammed to renew a pact on cutting oil production by their two nations, the world's leading exporters of crude.

Analysts had been touting a Russia-Saudi deal ahead of talks next week in Vienna of the OPEC oil cartel, as global crude prices have been slumping.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded Saturday that Saudi Arabia extradite suspects in the killing in Istanbul of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, taking to task the kingdom's crown prince who was basking in his quick return to the world stage at the G20.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded Saturday that Saudi Arabia extradite suspects in the killing in Istanbul of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, taking to task the kingdom's crown prince who was basking in his quick return to the world stage at the G20. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's presence at the summit of the Group of 20 powers in Buenos Aires demonstrated he was firmly in control, as he met with Western leaders and sealed an oil pact with Russian President Vladimir Putin. But the Turkish leader, also attending the G20, was visibly cooler toward the 33-year-old prince and on Saturday directly criticized him for the first time over the killing of Khashoggi, a royal confidant turned critic. Saudi Arabia has said that 21 people are in custody and vowed to keep probing the killing of Khashoggi, who was killed and dismembered after visiting the kingdom's Istanbul consulate to handle paperwork for his planned wedding. "It's essential that these people are tried in Turkey in order to eliminate any question marks that the international community may have," Erdogan told reporters in Buenos Aires. "Whoever has ordered and implemented this violent crime should be found out at once. Unless the perpetrators are found out, the whole world and the Islamic community shall not be satisfied." Erdogan said the Saudis have refused to help Turkish prosecutors with information on the whereabouts of Khashoggi's body and the identities of accomplices said to have supported the visiting Saudi hit squad. The Islamist-oriented Turkish leader, who has been vying for influence in the region with Saudi Arabia, said he did "not wish to cause any damage" to the royal family. But he criticized Prince Mohammed, saying that during the summit the Saudi heir apparent gave an "unbelievable explanation" on Khashoggi's killing. The prince told world leaders that "unless the crime is proven, you cannot blame Saudi Arabia," Erdogan quoted him as saying. "Of course, that might be valid from a legal point of view," Erdogan said. "But his own officials have admitted that this was a planned operation." Only Canada raises case Erdogan said that only one G20 leader -- Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau -- raised the journalist's killing in the full summit. Erdogan said that he himself did not bring up the case as time ran out in the session. Both French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Theresa May said they raised the Khashoggi case during private meetings with the crown prince, with Macron overheard on an open microphone telling him, "You never listen to me." Canada has been outspoken on human rights in Saudi Arabia, which has retaliated by breaking off diplomatic relations and vowing to end trade. But US President Donald Trump has said that it does not matter if the crown prince ordered the killing of Khashoggi, who lived near Washington because the kingdom is a major buyer of arms, supplier of oil and opponent of Iran. In a nod to growing criticism at home on Saudi Arabia, Trump only exchanged "pleasantries" with the crown prince, according to the White House. But Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with his Saudi counterpart in Buenos Aires, and again defended the US embrace of the crown prince. "There's no direct evidence linking him to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi," Pompeo told CNN. Reports implicate prince Several US news reports say that the CIA has concluded that the crown prince ordered the killing, even if there is no "smoking gun" evidence. The Wall Street Journal, quoting the CIA assessment, said Saturday that Prince Mohammed sent at least 11 messages in the hours before the killing to a close adviser charged with overseeing the murder. The crown prince enjoyed a buoyant welcome at the G20 on Friday from Putin, the two exchanging a high-five and grinning broadly as if they were long-lost friends. Putin said he had agreed with Prince Mohammed to renew a pact on cutting oil production by their two nations, the world's leading exporters of crude. Analysts had been touting a Russia-Saudi deal ahead of talks next week in Vienna of the OPEC oil cartel, as global crude prices have been slumping.

Khashoggi killing: Turkey's Erdogan demands suspects be handed over

Canada announced targeted<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/police-search-villas-in-northwest-turkey-for-khashoggi-remains-179602"> sanctions Thursday against 17 Saudi nationals</a> it said were linked to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month.

The sanctions, which freezes their <a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/khashoggis-daughters-promise-to-keep-his-legacy-alive-179214">assets and bars their travel</a> to Canada, "target individuals who are, in the opinion of the government of Canada, responsible for or complicit in the extrajudicial killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi on October 2, 2018," foreign affairs minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement.

At the same time, Ottawa continued to call for "a transparent and rigorous accounting of the circumstances" surrounding Khashoggi's murder, saying that "the explanations offered to date by Saudi Arabia lack consistency and credibility."

"The murder of Jamal Khashoggi is abhorrent and represents an unconscionable attack on the freedom of expression of all individuals," Freeland also told a press conference in Buenos Aires on the sidelines of the G20 summit.

"This case is not closed," she said. "Those responsible for Jamal Khashoggi's murder must be held to account and must face justice."

Freeland accompanied Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to the summit, also attended by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Saudi Arabia has said that 21 people are in custody, with death penalties sought against five men.

International pressure has mounted on Riyadh to find those responsible for the grisly murder of Khashoggi, a US resident who wrote for The Washington Post and had been critical of Prince Mohammed.

A recent CIA analysis leaked to the US media reportedly pointed the finger at Prince Mohammed, though Saudi prosecutors have said he had no role in the killing.

The Canadian sanctions target individuals alleged to be members of a Saudi hit squad that carried out the killing, as well as close aides of the prince.

They come after allies France, Germany and the United States imposed similar sanctions on these individuals.

Canada announced targeted sanctions Thursday against 17 Saudi nationals it said were linked to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month. The sanctions, which freezes their assets and bars their travel to Canada, "target individuals who are, in the opinion of the government of Canada, responsible for or complicit in the extrajudicial killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi on October 2, 2018," foreign affairs minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement.

Canada announced targeted sanctions Thursday against 17 Saudi nationals it said were linked to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month. The sanctions, which freezes their assets and bars their travel to Canada, "target individuals who are, in the opinion of the government of Canada, responsible for or complicit in the extrajudicial killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi on October 2, 2018," foreign affairs minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement. At the same time, Ottawa continued to call for "a transparent and rigorous accounting of the circumstances" surrounding Khashoggi's murder, saying that "the explanations offered to date by Saudi Arabia lack consistency and credibility." "The murder of Jamal Khashoggi is abhorrent and represents an unconscionable attack on the freedom of expression of all individuals," Freeland also told a press conference in Buenos Aires on the sidelines of the G20 summit. "This case is not closed," she said. "Those responsible for Jamal Khashoggi's murder must be held to account and must face justice." Freeland accompanied Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to the summit, also attended by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Saudi Arabia has said that 21 people are in custody, with death penalties sought against five men. International pressure has mounted on Riyadh to find those responsible for the grisly murder of Khashoggi, a US resident who wrote for The Washington Post and had been critical of Prince Mohammed. A recent CIA analysis leaked to the US media reportedly pointed the finger at Prince Mohammed, though Saudi prosecutors have said he had no role in the killing. The Canadian sanctions target individuals alleged to be members of a Saudi hit squad that carried out the killing, as well as close aides of the prince. They come after allies France, Germany and the United States imposed similar sanctions on these individuals.

Canada imposes sanctions against Saudi nationals allegedly linked to Khashoggi's murder

<a href="http://www.wionews.com/world/pompeo-mattis-to-brief-us-senators-on-saudi-as-concerns-mount-179651">Saudi Arabia</a> pledged $50 million in aid on Wednesday to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), which has been hit by the withdrawal of all US funding.

The announcement was made at a news conference in the Saudi capital by the director of the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre, Abdullah al-Rabeea.

UNRWA commissioner-general Pierre Krahenbuhl told the news conference that the agency had succeeded in containing spending following the decision by the administration of President Donald Trump in August to end all funding.&nbsp;

The United States had been by far the biggest contributor to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees and the move dealt a massive blow to its already stretched finances.

It threatened the closure of UNRWA schools both in the Palestinian territories and in the diaspora just weeks into the new academic year, as well as clinic closures and major job cuts.

Krahenbuhl said in Jordan last week that new funding pledges from Europe and other Gulf Arab states had allowed the agency to dramatically reduce the resulting budget shortfall, to just $21 million from $446 million at the start of the year.

More than five million registered Palestinian refugees are eligible to receive support from UNRWA, which was set up after Israel's creation in 1948.

The Trump administration has backed Israel in accusing the agency of perpetuating the Middle East conflict by maintaining the idea that millions of Palestinians are refugees with a right to return to homes in what is now Israel.

Aside from ending all US funding of UNRWA, the Trump administration has also cut $200 million in bilateral aid to the Palestinians for projects in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

In his address to the General Assembly in September, Trump said the United States would only give foreign aid "to those who respect us and frankly are our friends".

The Palestinians severed all ties with the administration after Trump's decision last December to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and declare the disputed city Israel's capital in a break with a decades-old bipartisan policy.

Saudi Arabia pledged $50 million in aid on Wednesday to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), which has been hit by the withdrawal of all US funding. The announcement was made at a news conference in the Saudi capital by the director of the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre, Abdullah al-Rabeea.

Saudi Arabia pledged $50 million in aid on Wednesday to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), which has been hit by the withdrawal of all US funding. The announcement was made at a news conference in the Saudi capital by the director of the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre, Abdullah al-Rabeea. UNRWA commissioner-general Pierre Krahenbuhl told the news conference that the agency had succeeded in containing spending following the decision by the administration of President Donald Trump in August to end all funding. The United States had been by far the biggest contributor to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees and the move dealt a massive blow to its already stretched finances. It threatened the closure of UNRWA schools both in the Palestinian territories and in the diaspora just weeks into the new academic year, as well as clinic closures and major job cuts. Krahenbuhl said in Jordan last week that new funding pledges from Europe and other Gulf Arab states had allowed the agency to dramatically reduce the resulting budget shortfall, to just $21 million from $446 million at the start of the year. More than five million registered Palestinian refugees are eligible to receive support from UNRWA, which was set up after Israel's creation in 1948. The Trump administration has backed Israel in accusing the agency of perpetuating the Middle East conflict by maintaining the idea that millions of Palestinians are refugees with a right to return to homes in what is now Israel. Aside from ending all US funding of UNRWA, the Trump administration has also cut $200 million in bilateral aid to the Palestinians for projects in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. In his address to the General Assembly in September, Trump said the United States would only give foreign aid "to those who respect us and frankly are our friends". The Palestinians severed all ties with the administration after Trump's decision last December to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and declare the disputed city Israel's capital in a break with a decades-old bipartisan policy.

Saudi Arabia pledges $50 million to UN Palestinian refugee agency

As Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman tours friendly Arab nations ahead of the Group of 20 (G-20) industrialised nations summit in Argentina, Saudi diplomacy aims to achieve two goals: put the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi behind it and thwart Qatari efforts to benefit from the kingdom’s predicament.

The Saudi campaign is producing predictably mixed results. It is proving successful with nations willing to back it for political, financial or economic gain, such as Bahrain, Egypt, Tunisia, and Palestine or nations like the United Arab Emirates, Russia and China that share Saudi Arabia’s illiberal, authoritarian values.

Prince Mohammed and the kingdom’s ties to Western nations, even those like the United States that have opted for maintaining close ties in the face of mounting criticism in their national legislatures, hang in the balance despite having survived the storm so far.

With the US Congress gearing up for potential action against Saudi Arabia, not only because of the October 2 killing of Khashoggi in the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate but also the humanitarian crisis sparked by Saudi military intervention in Yemen, President Donald J Trump has no plans to meet Prince Mohammed one on one at this weekend’s G-20 gathering.

Much like Trump’s decision may be perceived as a public slap, it does not suggest that Trump has backed away from his determination to shield US-Saudi relations and the crown prince from the potential fallout of the Khashoggi killing.

Similarly, Britain this week went ahead with joint exercises of the British and Saudi air forces although the United Kingdom has left open the possibility of imposing sanctions if the killing proves to have been government-sanctioned rather than an operation by rogue elements.

One key focus of the Saudi campaign appears to be Palestine and Iraq, countries not on Prince Mohammed’s travel schedule but where Qatar, that has been resisting an 18-month old Saudi-UAE-led economic and diplomatic boycott, stands to benefit from the Khashoggi crisis and that figure prominently in Trump’s designs for the Middle East.

Saudi Arabia this month said that it had transferred $60 million to President Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestine Authority, financially strapped as a result of the Trump administration cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in funding of the authority as well as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (Unwra) that supports Palestinian refugees.

Saudi Arabia’s resumption of funding followed several Palestinian statements in the last two months supporting the kingdom’s assertion that it had not sanctioned the killing of Khashoggi and expressing confidence in the Saudi judiciary’s ability to mete out justice to the culprits.

Saudi Arabia, ostensibly at Prince Mohammed’s behest, had in the past year withheld payments to the Palestine Authority because of its refusal to engage with the United States following Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the authority’s support for Turkey’s leadership in rallying Muslim opposition to US policy.

The resumption of funding is also in line with King Salman’s intervention in the last year insisting that the kingdom was committed to Palestinian rights, including declaring East Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state.

It also coincided with Israeli acquiescence in the flow of $150 million from Qatar to Gaza, controlled by Islamist Hamas, in a bid to alleviate the crippling impact of an Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the region and prevent tension between Israel and the group spinning out of control.

Beyond countering expanding Qatari influence, the Saudi move is likely to increase the kingdom’s leverage in pressuring the Palestine Authority to back off its refusal to entertain a mooted US Israeli-Palestinian peace plan that has yet to be made public but would be stillborn without Palestinian participation.

Similarly, Saudi Arabia and Qatar are competing for influence in Iraq, another battleground that is important to both the United States and the kingdom because of the close ties between Iraq and Iran.

Senior Saudi and Qatari officials have frequented Baghdad in recent weeks as Iraq’s new prime minister, Adel Abdul Mahdi, puts his cabinet together and pushes an ambitious economic development plan that is dependent on foreign investment.

Even though Iraq is likely to balance relations between the two Gulf rivals, it is also not going to trouble its burgeoning relationship with the kingdom by speaking out on the Khashoggi issue.

Prince Mohammed, despite protests in Tunisia, the only country on the crown prince’s itinerary that has not brutally suppressed freedom of expression, and a legal challenge in Argentina, which could curtail his future travel plans even if it does not stop him from attending the G-20 summit, has proven in recent days that he is not universally persona non grata.

Nonetheless, his reception in Argentina by world leaders is likely to be a litmus test of the degree of reputational damage that he and the kingdom have suffered. Trump’s apparent hesitancy to meet separately with the crown prince could set the tone if indeed the president sticks by his initial decision. 
 
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

As Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman tours friendly Arab nations ahead of the Group of 20 (G-20) industrialised nations summit in Argentina, Saudi diplomacy aims to achieve two goals: put the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi behind it and thwart Qatari efforts to benefit from the kingdom’s predicament.

As Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman tours friendly Arab nations ahead of the Group of 20 (G-20) industrialised nations summit in Argentina, Saudi diplomacy aims to achieve two goals: put the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi behind it and thwart Qatari efforts to benefit from the kingdom’s predicament. The Saudi campaign is producing predictably mixed results. It is proving successful with nations willing to back it for political, financial or economic gain, such as Bahrain, Egypt, Tunisia, and Palestine or nations like the United Arab Emirates, Russia and China that share Saudi Arabia’s illiberal, authoritarian values. Prince Mohammed and the kingdom’s ties to Western nations, even those like the United States that have opted for maintaining close ties in the face of mounting criticism in their national legislatures, hang in the balance despite having survived the storm so far. With the US Congress gearing up for potential action against Saudi Arabia, not only because of the October 2 killing of Khashoggi in the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate but also the humanitarian crisis sparked by Saudi military intervention in Yemen, President Donald J Trump has no plans to meet Prince Mohammed one on one at this weekend’s G-20 gathering. Much like Trump’s decision may be perceived as a public slap, it does not suggest that Trump has backed away from his determination to shield US-Saudi relations and the crown prince from the potential fallout of the Khashoggi killing. Similarly, Britain this week went ahead with joint exercises of the British and Saudi air forces although the United Kingdom has left open the possibility of imposing sanctions if the killing proves to have been government-sanctioned rather than an operation by rogue elements. One key focus of the Saudi campaign appears to be Palestine and Iraq, countries not on Prince Mohammed’s travel schedule but where Qatar, that has been resisting an 18-month old Saudi-UAE-led economic and diplomatic boycott, stands to benefit from the Khashoggi crisis and that figure prominently in Trump’s designs for the Middle East. Saudi Arabia this month said that it had transferred $60 million to President Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestine Authority, financially strapped as a result of the Trump administration cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in funding of the authority as well as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (Unwra) that supports Palestinian refugees. Saudi Arabia’s resumption of funding followed several Palestinian statements in the last two months supporting the kingdom’s assertion that it had not sanctioned the killing of Khashoggi and expressing confidence in the Saudi judiciary’s ability to mete out justice to the culprits. Saudi Arabia, ostensibly at Prince Mohammed’s behest, had in the past year withheld payments to the Palestine Authority because of its refusal to engage with the United States following Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the authority’s support for Turkey’s leadership in rallying Muslim opposition to US policy. The resumption of funding is also in line with King Salman’s intervention in the last year insisting that the kingdom was committed to Palestinian rights, including declaring East Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state. It also coincided with Israeli acquiescence in the flow of $150 million from Qatar to Gaza, controlled by Islamist Hamas, in a bid to alleviate the crippling impact of an Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the region and prevent tension between Israel and the group spinning out of control. Beyond countering expanding Qatari influence, the Saudi move is likely to increase the kingdom’s leverage in pressuring the Palestine Authority to back off its refusal to entertain a mooted US Israeli-Palestinian peace plan that has yet to be made public but would be stillborn without Palestinian participation. Similarly, Saudi Arabia and Qatar are competing for influence in Iraq, another battleground that is important to both the United States and the kingdom because of the close ties between Iraq and Iran. Senior Saudi and Qatari officials have frequented Baghdad in recent weeks as Iraq’s new prime minister, Adel Abdul Mahdi, puts his cabinet together and pushes an ambitious economic development plan that is dependent on foreign investment. Even though Iraq is likely to balance relations between the two Gulf rivals, it is also not going to trouble its burgeoning relationship with the kingdom by speaking out on the Khashoggi issue. Prince Mohammed, despite protests in Tunisia, the only country on the crown prince’s itinerary that has not brutally suppressed freedom of expression, and a legal challenge in Argentina, which could curtail his future travel plans even if it does not stop him from attending the G-20 summit, has proven in recent days that he is not universally persona non grata. Nonetheless, his reception in Argentina by world leaders is likely to be a litmus test of the degree of reputational damage that he and the kingdom have suffered. Trump’s apparent hesitancy to meet separately with the crown prince could set the tone if indeed the president sticks by his initial decision. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

How Saudi and Qatar are competing over Iraq

By Jeff Bachman

A Saudi-led coalition of states has been aggressively bombing Yemen and imposing an air and naval blockade of its ports for more than three years, leading UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to describe Yemen as “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.”

Guterres put the crisis in stark perspective, emphasizing the near complete lack of security for the Yemeni people. More than 22 million people out of a total population of 28 million are in need of humanitarian aid and protection. Eighteen million people lack reliable access to food; 8.4 million people “do not know how they will obtain their next meal.”

As a scholar of genocide and human rights, I believe the destruction brought about by these attacks combined with the blockade amounts to genocide.

Based on my research, to be published in an upcoming issue of Third World Quarterly, I believe the coalition would not be capable of committing this crime without the material and logistical support of both the Obama and Trump administrations.

A ‘storm’ recast as ‘hope’

Yemen has been gripped by a civil war since 2015, pitting the Shia Houthi movement – which has fought for centuries for control of parts of Yemen – against a government backed by Sunni Saudi Arabia. Because of these religious differences, it would be easy to recast what is largely a political conflict in Yemen as a sectarian one.

That characterisation fits Saudi and US&nbsp;assertions that the Houthis are controlled by Shiite Iran, a claim that has not gone uncontested. Both the Saudis and the US&nbsp;are hostile to Iran, so US&nbsp;support of Saudia Arabia in Yemen represents what US&nbsp;administrations have said are strategic interests in the region.

Besides Saudi Arabia, the coalition attacking Yemen includes the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, Sudan, Kuwait and Bahrain. Qatar was part of the coalition but is no longer.

During the first three years of “Operation Decisive Storm,” later renamed “Operation Renewal of Hope,” 16,749 coalition air attacks in Yemen were documented by the Yemen Data Project (YDP), which describes itself as an “independent data collection project aimed at collecting and disseminating data on the conduct of the war in Yemen.”

Based on the information available to it using open sources, YDP reports that two-thirds of the coalition’s bombing attacks have been against non-military and unknown targets. The coalition isn’t accidentally attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure – it’s doing it deliberately.

That’s evident from the kind – and volume – of civilian targets documented. They include places that are generally protected against attack even under the lax rules of international humanitarian law: Residential areas, vehicles, marketplaces and mosques as well as boats, social gatherings and camps for internally displaced persons.

Because of the role&nbsp;it plays in the movement of people, food and medicine, Yemen’s transportation infrastructure is especially important. Airports, ports, bridges and roads have all been repeatedly attacked.

Yemen’s economic infrastructure – farms, private businesses and factories, oil and gas facilities, water and electricity lines and food storage – have also been hit. And the coalition has targeted and destroyed schools and medical facilities, too.

Finally, Yemen’s cultural heritage has been attacked. In all, at least 78 cultural sites have been damaged or destroyed, including archaeological sites, museums, mosques, churches and tombs, as well as numerous other monuments and residences that have great historical and cultural significance.

How to make a crisis

The attacks aren’t the only way the coalition is creating a massive humanitarian crisis.

The air and naval blockade, in effect since March 2015, “is essentially using the threat of starvation as a bargaining tool and an instrument of war,” according to the UN panel of experts on Yemen.

The blockade stops and inspects vessels seeking entry to Yemen’s ports. That allows the coalition to regulate and restrict Yemenis’ access to food, fuel, medical supplies and humanitarian aid.

In his analysis of the blockade’s legality, Dutch military scholar Martin Fink writes that the blockade means “massive time delays and uncertainty on what products would be allowed to enter.”

Despite UN efforts to alleviate some of the worst delays, imports are often held up for a long time. In some cases, food that makes it through the blockade has already spoiled, if the entry is not denied altogether.

In some ways, the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is unprecedented and can be tied directly to the conflict. As the World Bank notes, “Yemen’s very difficult economic challenges before the current conflict cannot be compared to the intensely critical situation the country is facing today.”

Similarly, Tufts University scholar Alex de Waal describes Yemen as “the greatest famine atrocity of our lifetimes.” It was caused, writes de Waal, by the coalition “deliberately destroying the country’s food-producing infrastructure.”

The failing security for the people of Yemen has been compounded by a failing health system. The World Health Organisation reported in September 2017 that only 45 per cent of health facilities in Yemen were functional.

As Secretary-General Guterres put it, “Treatable illnesses become a death sentence when local health services are suspended and it is impossible to travel outside the country.”

As of February 2018, according to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the coalition had killed 6,000 people in airstrikes and wounded nearly 10,000 more.

Yet, according to the OHCHR report, these counts are conservative. Tens of thousands of Yemenis have also died from causes related to the war. According to Save the Children, an estimated 85,000 children under five may have died since 2015, with more than 50,000 child deaths in 2017 alone from hunger and related causes.

Coalition actions in Yemen amount to nothing short of what Raphael Lemkin, the individual who coined the term “genocide,” referred to as a “synchronized attack on different aspects of life.”

The US contribution 
 
The coalition’s genocide in Yemen would not be possible without the complicity of the US. This has been a bipartisan presidential effort, covering both the Obama and Trump administrations.

US arms are being used to kill Yemenis and destroy their country. In 2016, well after the coalition began its genocidal assault on Yemen, four of the top five recipients of US arms sales were members of the coalition.

The US has also provided the coalition with logistical support, including mid-air refuelling, targeting advice and support, intelligence, expedited munitions resupply and maintenance.

Other than the sale of arms, perhaps the most significant contribution to the coalition’s ability to commit genocide in Yemen has been the provision of fuel and mid-air refuelling of coalition warplanes, which was halted in early November 2018. By the middle of 2017, the US had delivered over 67 million pounds of fuel to the coalition and refuelled coalition aircraft more than 9,000 times.

Shared responsibility for genocide

As a genocide scholar, I believe that under international law, the US shares responsibility with the coalition for genocide in Yemen.

What does this mean? It means that the US&nbsp;must cease and desist all activities that facilitate genocide in Yemen. This would include stopping all sales of weapons and ending logistical support for coalition action.

In an ideal world, one in which all states are equally subjects before international law, the US would also seek an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice regarding what restitution it owes the people of Yemen for its role in the coalition’s genocide.

Similarly, the US would request an International Criminal Court investigation into individual culpability of US officials in both the Obama and Trump administrations for their role in facilitating the crimes committed in Yemen.

Of course, this is not an ideal world.

The US&nbsp;recognises neither the International Court of Justice’s authority to judge the legality of its actions, nor the International Criminal Court’s authority to investigate the suspected criminal acts of individual US officials. Such an investigation could be triggered by a UN&nbsp;Security Council referral, but the US would simply veto any such effort.

All that is left, then, is for the people of the US to hold their own to account for the crimes committed in their names. 
 
(Jeff Bachman is Professorial Lecturer in Human Rights, American University School of International Service)

(This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-complicity-in-the-saudi-led-genocide-in-yemen-spans-obama-trump-administrations-106896">original article</a>)

(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL) 
&nbsp;

By Jeff Bachman A Saudi-led coalition of states has been aggressively bombing Yemen and imposing an air and naval blockade of its ports for more than three years, leading UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to describe Yemen as “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

By Jeff Bachman A Saudi-led coalition of states has been aggressively bombing Yemen and imposing an air and naval blockade of its ports for more than three years, leading UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to describe Yemen as “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.” Guterres put the crisis in stark perspective, emphasizing the near complete lack of security for the Yemeni people. More than 22 million people out of a total population of 28 million are in need of humanitarian aid and protection. Eighteen million people lack reliable access to food; 8.4 million people “do not know how they will obtain their next meal.” As a scholar of genocide and human rights, I believe the destruction brought about by these attacks combined with the blockade amounts to genocide. Based on my research, to be published in an upcoming issue of Third World Quarterly, I believe the coalition would not be capable of committing this crime without the material and logistical support of both the Obama and Trump administrations. A ‘storm’ recast as ‘hope’ Yemen has been gripped by a civil war since 2015, pitting the Shia Houthi movement – which has fought for centuries for control of parts of Yemen – against a government backed by Sunni Saudi Arabia. Because of these religious differences, it would be easy to recast what is largely a political conflict in Yemen as a sectarian one. That characterisation fits Saudi and US assertions that the Houthis are controlled by Shiite Iran, a claim that has not gone uncontested. Both the Saudis and the US are hostile to Iran, so US support of Saudia Arabia in Yemen represents what US administrations have said are strategic interests in the region. Besides Saudi Arabia, the coalition attacking Yemen includes the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, Sudan, Kuwait and Bahrain. Qatar was part of the coalition but is no longer. During the first three years of “Operation Decisive Storm,” later renamed “Operation Renewal of Hope,” 16,749 coalition air attacks in Yemen were documented by the Yemen Data Project (YDP), which describes itself as an “independent data collection project aimed at collecting and disseminating data on the conduct of the war in Yemen.” Based on the information available to it using open sources, YDP reports that two-thirds of the coalition’s bombing attacks have been against non-military and unknown targets. The coalition isn’t accidentally attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure – it’s doing it deliberately. That’s evident from the kind – and volume – of civilian targets documented. They include places that are generally protected against attack even under the lax rules of international humanitarian law: Residential areas, vehicles, marketplaces and mosques as well as boats, social gatherings and camps for internally displaced persons. Because of the role it plays in the movement of people, food and medicine, Yemen’s transportation infrastructure is especially important. Airports, ports, bridges and roads have all been repeatedly attacked. Yemen’s economic infrastructure – farms, private businesses and factories, oil and gas facilities, water and electricity lines and food storage – have also been hit. And the coalition has targeted and destroyed schools and medical facilities, too. Finally, Yemen’s cultural heritage has been attacked. In all, at least 78 cultural sites have been damaged or destroyed, including archaeological sites, museums, mosques, churches and tombs, as well as numerous other monuments and residences that have great historical and cultural significance. How to make a crisis The attacks aren’t the only way the coalition is creating a massive humanitarian crisis. The air and naval blockade, in effect since March 2015, “is essentially using the threat of starvation as a bargaining tool and an instrument of war,” according to the UN panel of experts on Yemen. The blockade stops and inspects vessels seeking entry to Yemen’s ports. That allows the coalition to regulate and restrict Yemenis’ access to food, fuel, medical supplies and humanitarian aid. In his analysis of the blockade’s legality, Dutch military scholar Martin Fink writes that the blockade means “massive time delays and uncertainty on what products would be allowed to enter.” Despite UN efforts to alleviate some of the worst delays, imports are often held up for a long time. In some cases, food that makes it through the blockade has already spoiled, if the entry is not denied altogether. In some ways, the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is unprecedented and can be tied directly to the conflict. As the World Bank notes, “Yemen’s very difficult economic challenges before the current conflict cannot be compared to the intensely critical situation the country is facing today.” Similarly, Tufts University scholar Alex de Waal describes Yemen as “the greatest famine atrocity of our lifetimes.” It was caused, writes de Waal, by the coalition “deliberately destroying the country’s food-producing infrastructure.” The failing security for the people of Yemen has been compounded by a failing health system. The World Health Organisation reported in September 2017 that only 45 per cent of health facilities in Yemen were functional. As Secretary-General Guterres put it, “Treatable illnesses become a death sentence when local health services are suspended and it is impossible to travel outside the country.” As of February 2018, according to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the coalition had killed 6,000 people in airstrikes and wounded nearly 10,000 more. Yet, according to the OHCHR report, these counts are conservative. Tens of thousands of Yemenis have also died from causes related to the war. According to Save the Children, an estimated 85,000 children under five may have died since 2015, with more than 50,000 child deaths in 2017 alone from hunger and related causes. Coalition actions in Yemen amount to nothing short of what Raphael Lemkin, the individual who coined the term “genocide,” referred to as a “synchronized attack on different aspects of life.” The US contribution The coalition’s genocide in Yemen would not be possible without the complicity of the US. This has been a bipartisan presidential effort, covering both the Obama and Trump administrations. US arms are being used to kill Yemenis and destroy their country. In 2016, well after the coalition began its genocidal assault on Yemen, four of the top five recipients of US arms sales were members of the coalition. The US has also provided the coalition with logistical support, including mid-air refuelling, targeting advice and support, intelligence, expedited munitions resupply and maintenance. Other than the sale of arms, perhaps the most significant contribution to the coalition’s ability to commit genocide in Yemen has been the provision of fuel and mid-air refuelling of coalition warplanes, which was halted in early November 2018. By the middle of 2017, the US had delivered over 67 million pounds of fuel to the coalition and refuelled coalition aircraft more than 9,000 times. Shared responsibility for genocide As a genocide scholar, I believe that under international law, the US shares responsibility with the coalition for genocide in Yemen. What does this mean? It means that the US must cease and desist all activities that facilitate genocide in Yemen. This would include stopping all sales of weapons and ending logistical support for coalition action. In an ideal world, one in which all states are equally subjects before international law, the US would also seek an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice regarding what restitution it owes the people of Yemen for its role in the coalition’s genocide. Similarly, the US would request an International Criminal Court investigation into individual culpability of US officials in both the Obama and Trump administrations for their role in facilitating the crimes committed in Yemen. Of course, this is not an ideal world. The US recognises neither the International Court of Justice’s authority to judge the legality of its actions, nor the International Criminal Court’s authority to investigate the suspected criminal acts of individual US officials. Such an investigation could be triggered by a UN Security Council referral, but the US would simply veto any such effort. All that is left, then, is for the people of the US to hold their own to account for the crimes committed in their names. (Jeff Bachman is Professorial Lecturer in Human Rights, American University School of International Service) (This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article) (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

US complicity in the Saudi-led genocide in Yemen spans Obama, Trump administrations

When Saudi General Khalid bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz went shopping in the late 1980s for Chinese medium-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear, chemical or biological warheads he made no bones about keeping the United States, one of the kingdom’s closest allies, in the dark.

It was “my task to negotiate the deal, devise an appropriate deception plan, choose a team of Saudi officers and men and arrange for their training in both Saudi Arabia and China, build and defend operation bases and storage facilities in different parts of the kingdom, arrange for the shipment of the missiles from China and, at every stage, be ready to defend the project against sabotage or any form of attack,” General Bin Sultan, a son of the late Saudi crown prince and defense minister, Sultan bin Abdul Aziz al Saud, and commander of the US-led international alliance that forced Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait in 1991, recounted in his memoir.

The incident coupled with more recent Saudi statements and the kingdom’s inability to present from the outset a credible and sustainable version of events surrounding the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi on the premises of its Istanbul consulate is complicating its negotiations with the United States for the acquisition of designs for nuclear power plants, a deal valued at up to $80 billion depending on how many Saudi Arabia ultimately decides to build.

Prospects of a massive deal go to the heart of US President Donald J Trump’s jobs and deals-focussed America First policy. Yet, growing criticism and distrust of Saudi Arabia in the US Congress and intelligence community as a result of the Khashoggi crisis and the kingdom’s handling of the Yemen war that has sparked the world’s worst humanitarian crisis since World War Two are likely to strengthen efforts to thwart an agreement that honours Saudi insistence on producing its own nuclear fuel, even though it could buy it more cheaply abroad.

The Saudi insistence has fuelled concerns that the kingdom may divert their fuel for military purposes. Those kinds of fears coupled with Iran’s ballistic missile program drove world powers to first sanction Iran and then conclude a 2015 international agreement that curbed Iran’s nuclear program. Trump withdrew from the agreement earlier this year, charging that it did not provide sufficient guarantees that Iran would not be able to develop a nuclear weapon.

Democrats in the US Congress have described refusing to sell Saudi Arabia nuclear technology as proper punishment for the killing of Khashoggi that the kingdom insists was done without the knowledge of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

While the Trump administration has as yet not abandoned long-standing strict US nuclear export safeguards to secure a deal with Saudi Arabia, it has also not unambiguously said that it would uphold them.

Like with his rejection of hard-hitting sanctions in the wake of the Khashoggi killing, Trump is likely to ultimately argue that if the United States does not conclude a nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia, countries like China, Russia and South Korea, that have less strict controls will. The argument amounts to the equivalent of committing a wrong because if one doesn’t, someone else will.

Saudi officials have repeatedly insisted that the kingdom is developing nuclear capabilities for peaceful purposes such as medicine, electricity generation, and desalination of sea water. They say that Saudi Arabia is committed to putting its future facilities under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Yet, with a $56 billion military budget for 2018, Saudi Arabia is stepping up the development of a domestic military industry. The kingdom aims to source 50 per cent of its military procurement domestically by 2030, up from its current two per cent.

Speaking to CBS earlier this year, Prince Mohammed appeared to put conditions on Saudi nuclear assurances by warning that “Saudi Arabia does not want to acquire any nuclear bomb, but without a doubt, if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.”

In putting forward &nbsp;demands for parity with Iran by getting the right to controlled enrichment of uranium and the reprocessing of spent fuel into plutonium, potential building blocks for nuclear weapons, Saudi Arabia was also seen as potentially backing away from a 2009 memorandum of understanding with the United States in which it pledged to acquire nuclear fuel from international markets.

Nuclear energy cooperation was one of a host of agreements concluded last year by Saudi Arabia and China during a visit to Beijing by Saudi King Salman. The agreement included a feasibility study for the construction of high-temperature gas-cooled (HTGR) nuclear power plants in the kingdom as well as cooperation in intellectual property and the development of a domestic industrial supply chain for HTGRs built in Saudi Arabia. The HTGR agreement built on an accord signed in 2012 that involved maintenance and development of nuclear power plants and research reactors, as well as the provision of Chinese nuclear fuel.

A report by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) released shortly after the king’s visit warned that the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement had “not eliminated the kingdom’s desire for nuclear weapons capabilities and even nuclear weapons.”

Much like the era of General Bin Sultan, potential Chinese sales to Saudi Arabia of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles remain one of the murkier areas of Sino-Saudi military cooperation.

Military experts say that satellite imagery of missile bases in Saudi Arabia in recent years and other open-source circumstantial evidence, including Saudi press coverage of graduation ceremonies at the kingdom’s Strategic Missile Force school in Wadi ad-Dawasir, attest to ongoing transfers.

Saudi Arabia in 2014 showcased Chinese-made Dongfeng-3 missiles that have a range of up to 5,000 kilometres. Media reports said the missiles had been purchased in 2007, possibly with US acquiescence.

“Saudi Arabia has invested heavily in conventional ballistic and cruise missiles to provide the kingdom a shot of strategic deterrence,” said non-proliferation expert Jeffrey Lewis. Lewis’ conclusion was confirmed by Anwar Eshqi, a retired Saudi major general and advisor to the Saudi military.

“The Saudi military did indeed receive DF-21 missiles from China and the integration of the missiles, including a full maintenance check and upgraded facilities, is complete, “ Eshqi said referring to the People’s Republic’s East Wind solid-fuel, medium-range ballistic missile. 
 
(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

When Saudi General Khalid bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz went shopping in the late 1980s for Chinese medium-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear, chemical or biological warheads he made no bones about keeping the United States, one of the kingdom’s closest allies, in the dark.

When Saudi General Khalid bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz went shopping in the late 1980s for Chinese medium-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear, chemical or biological warheads he made no bones about keeping the United States, one of the kingdom’s closest allies, in the dark. It was “my task to negotiate the deal, devise an appropriate deception plan, choose a team of Saudi officers and men and arrange for their training in both Saudi Arabia and China, build and defend operation bases and storage facilities in different parts of the kingdom, arrange for the shipment of the missiles from China and, at every stage, be ready to defend the project against sabotage or any form of attack,” General Bin Sultan, a son of the late Saudi crown prince and defense minister, Sultan bin Abdul Aziz al Saud, and commander of the US-led international alliance that forced Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait in 1991, recounted in his memoir. The incident coupled with more recent Saudi statements and the kingdom’s inability to present from the outset a credible and sustainable version of events surrounding the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi on the premises of its Istanbul consulate is complicating its negotiations with the United States for the acquisition of designs for nuclear power plants, a deal valued at up to $80 billion depending on how many Saudi Arabia ultimately decides to build. Prospects of a massive deal go to the heart of US President Donald J Trump’s jobs and deals-focussed America First policy. Yet, growing criticism and distrust of Saudi Arabia in the US Congress and intelligence community as a result of the Khashoggi crisis and the kingdom’s handling of the Yemen war that has sparked the world’s worst humanitarian crisis since World War Two are likely to strengthen efforts to thwart an agreement that honours Saudi insistence on producing its own nuclear fuel, even though it could buy it more cheaply abroad. The Saudi insistence has fuelled concerns that the kingdom may divert their fuel for military purposes. Those kinds of fears coupled with Iran’s ballistic missile program drove world powers to first sanction Iran and then conclude a 2015 international agreement that curbed Iran’s nuclear program. Trump withdrew from the agreement earlier this year, charging that it did not provide sufficient guarantees that Iran would not be able to develop a nuclear weapon. Democrats in the US Congress have described refusing to sell Saudi Arabia nuclear technology as proper punishment for the killing of Khashoggi that the kingdom insists was done without the knowledge of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. While the Trump administration has as yet not abandoned long-standing strict US nuclear export safeguards to secure a deal with Saudi Arabia, it has also not unambiguously said that it would uphold them. Like with his rejection of hard-hitting sanctions in the wake of the Khashoggi killing, Trump is likely to ultimately argue that if the United States does not conclude a nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia, countries like China, Russia and South Korea, that have less strict controls will. The argument amounts to the equivalent of committing a wrong because if one doesn’t, someone else will. Saudi officials have repeatedly insisted that the kingdom is developing nuclear capabilities for peaceful purposes such as medicine, electricity generation, and desalination of sea water. They say that Saudi Arabia is committed to putting its future facilities under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Yet, with a $56 billion military budget for 2018, Saudi Arabia is stepping up the development of a domestic military industry. The kingdom aims to source 50 per cent of its military procurement domestically by 2030, up from its current two per cent. Speaking to CBS earlier this year, Prince Mohammed appeared to put conditions on Saudi nuclear assurances by warning that “Saudi Arabia does not want to acquire any nuclear bomb, but without a doubt, if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.” In putting forward demands for parity with Iran by getting the right to controlled enrichment of uranium and the reprocessing of spent fuel into plutonium, potential building blocks for nuclear weapons, Saudi Arabia was also seen as potentially backing away from a 2009 memorandum of understanding with the United States in which it pledged to acquire nuclear fuel from international markets. Nuclear energy cooperation was one of a host of agreements concluded last year by Saudi Arabia and China during a visit to Beijing by Saudi King Salman. The agreement included a feasibility study for the construction of high-temperature gas-cooled (HTGR) nuclear power plants in the kingdom as well as cooperation in intellectual property and the development of a domestic industrial supply chain for HTGRs built in Saudi Arabia. The HTGR agreement built on an accord signed in 2012 that involved maintenance and development of nuclear power plants and research reactors, as well as the provision of Chinese nuclear fuel. A report by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) released shortly after the king’s visit warned that the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement had “not eliminated the kingdom’s desire for nuclear weapons capabilities and even nuclear weapons.” Much like the era of General Bin Sultan, potential Chinese sales to Saudi Arabia of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles remain one of the murkier areas of Sino-Saudi military cooperation. Military experts say that satellite imagery of missile bases in Saudi Arabia in recent years and other open-source circumstantial evidence, including Saudi press coverage of graduation ceremonies at the kingdom’s Strategic Missile Force school in Wadi ad-Dawasir, attest to ongoing transfers. Saudi Arabia in 2014 showcased Chinese-made Dongfeng-3 missiles that have a range of up to 5,000 kilometres. Media reports said the missiles had been purchased in 2007, possibly with US acquiescence. “Saudi Arabia has invested heavily in conventional ballistic and cruise missiles to provide the kingdom a shot of strategic deterrence,” said non-proliferation expert Jeffrey Lewis. Lewis’ conclusion was confirmed by Anwar Eshqi, a retired Saudi major general and advisor to the Saudi military. “The Saudi military did indeed receive DF-21 missiles from China and the integration of the missiles, including a full maintenance check and upgraded facilities, is complete, “ Eshqi said referring to the People’s Republic’s East Wind solid-fuel, medium-range ballistic missile. (Disclaimer: The opinions expressed above are the personal views of the author and do not reflect the views of ZMCL)

What Khashoggi killing means for US-Saudi Nuclear talks

Saudi energy giant Aramco has signed 31 agreements and memoranda of understandings worth $27.5 billion with local and international suppliers, CEO Amin Nasser said Monday.

"We signed $27.5 billion (24 billion euros) in a total of 31 commercial collaborations," Nasser said in a statement at an investment forum held in the eastern Saudi city of Dhahran.

The company did not provide details on the nature of the deals.

Last month, Aramco said it signed agreements and MOUs with scores of energy companies worth over $50 billion at a showcase investment summit boycotted by many international companies and dignitaries over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Insider-turned-critic Khashoggi was killed and reportedly dismembered in Saudi Arabia's Istanbul consulate on October 2 in what the kingdom said was a "rogue" operation.

More than 1,000 local and international energy service and equipment suppliers and manufacturers attended Monday's forum.

OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia pumps over 10 million barrels per day of crude oil in addition to around 12 billion cubic feet of natural gas.

Saudi energy giant Aramco has signed 31 agreements and memoranda of understandings worth $27.5 billion with local and international suppliers, CEO Amin Nasser said Monday.

Saudi energy giant Aramco has signed 31 agreements and memoranda of understandings worth $27.5 billion with local and international suppliers, CEO Amin Nasser said Monday. "We signed $27.5 billion (24 billion euros) in a total of 31 commercial collaborations," Nasser said in a statement at an investment forum held in the eastern Saudi city of Dhahran. The company did not provide details on the nature of the deals. Last month, Aramco said it signed agreements and MOUs with scores of energy companies worth over $50 billion at a showcase investment summit boycotted by many international companies and dignitaries over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Insider-turned-critic Khashoggi was killed and reportedly dismembered in Saudi Arabia's Istanbul consulate on October 2 in what the kingdom said was a "rogue" operation. More than 1,000 local and international energy service and equipment suppliers and manufacturers attended Monday's forum. OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia pumps over 10 million barrels per day of crude oil in addition to around 12 billion cubic feet of natural gas.

Saudi energy giant Aramco signs deals worth $27.5 billion

In a poignant farewell to their father published in The Washington Post, the daughters of slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi vowed that "his light would never fade" and that his legacy lived through them.

Khashoggi, former Saudi royal insider who became a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was murdered at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul last month.

His death unleashed a global wave of criticism against the crown prince, who Saudi officials say had no role in the killing.

"This is no eulogy, for that would confer a state of closure," Noha Khashoggi and Razan Jamal Khashoggi wrote in a Post opinion piece published online Friday.

"Rather, this is a promise that his light will never fade, that his legacy will be preserved within us."

The 59-year-old journalist was at the consulate in Istanbul seeking documents needed to marry his Turkish fiancee. Riyadh -- after weeks of denial -- said he was killed in a "rogue" operation.

The daughters remember their father, affectionately referred to as "Baba," as a "loving man with a big heart" who travelled widely and always returned bearing "gifts and fascinating stories."

"As bittersweet as it was, we knew from a young age ... that he was an important man whose words had an effect on people over a great distance." 
It was vital for him "to speak up, to share his opinions, to have candid discussions," the daughters recall.

For him "writing was not just a job; it was a compulsion. It was ingrained into the core of his identity, and it truly kept him alive.

"Now, his words keep his spirit with us, and we are grateful for that."

Khashoggi had created a new life in the United States, but "he grieved" for his native Saudi Arabia, never abandoning hope for his country.

"Dad was no dissident," the daughters wrote.&nbsp;

"If being a writer was ingrained in his identity, being a Saudi was part of that same grain."

In a poignant farewell to their father published in The Washington Post, the daughters of slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi vowed that "his light would never fade" and that his legacy lived through them.

In a poignant farewell to their father published in The Washington Post, the daughters of slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi vowed that "his light would never fade" and that his legacy lived through them. Khashoggi, former Saudi royal insider who became a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was murdered at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul last month. His death unleashed a global wave of criticism against the crown prince, who Saudi officials say had no role in the killing. "This is no eulogy, for that would confer a state of closure," Noha Khashoggi and Razan Jamal Khashoggi wrote in a Post opinion piece published online Friday. "Rather, this is a promise that his light will never fade, that his legacy will be preserved within us." The 59-year-old journalist was at the consulate in Istanbul seeking documents needed to marry his Turkish fiancee. Riyadh -- after weeks of denial -- said he was killed in a "rogue" operation. The daughters remember their father, affectionately referred to as "Baba," as a "loving man with a big heart" who travelled widely and always returned bearing "gifts and fascinating stories." "As bittersweet as it was, we knew from a young age ... that he was an important man whose words had an effect on people over a great distance." It was vital for him "to speak up, to share his opinions, to have candid discussions," the daughters recall. For him "writing was not just a job; it was a compulsion. It was ingrained into the core of his identity, and it truly kept him alive. "Now, his words keep his spirit with us, and we are grateful for that." Khashoggi had created a new life in the United States, but "he grieved" for his native Saudi Arabia, never abandoning hope for his country. "Dad was no dissident," the daughters wrote. "If being a writer was ingrained in his identity, being a Saudi was part of that same grain."

Slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi's daughters promise to keep his legacy alive

A senior Saudi prince cast doubt upon the reported CIA finding that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month, saying the agency could not be counted on to reach a credible conclusion.

"The CIA is not necessarily the highest standard of veracity or accuracy in assessing situations. The examples of that are multitude," Prince Turki al-Faisal, a senior member of the royal family, told journalists in Abu Dhabi on Saturday.

The prince, a former Saudi intelligence chief who has also served as ambassador to the United States, said the agency`s conclusion that Iraq possessed chemical weapons before the US invasion in 2003 showed it could be unreliable.

"That was the most glaring of inaccurate and wrong assessments, which led to a full-scale war with thousands being killed," he said, speaking at an event hosted by the New York-based Beirut Institute.

"I don`t see why the CIA is not on trial in the United States. This is my answer to their assessment of who is guilty and who is not and who did what in the consulate in Istanbul."

The CIA has concluded that Prince Mohammed ordered the operation to kill Khashoggi, as first reported by the Washington Post, and briefed other parts of the US government on its findings, sources told Reuters last week.

US President Donald Trump has disputed that the agency reached a conclusion on the murder, saying instead "they have feelings certain ways."

A Turkish newspaper also reported on Thursday that CIA director Gina Haspel signaled to Turkish officials that the agency had a recording of a call in which the crown prince gave instructions to "silence" the journalist.

Khashoggi was killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2 in an operation that Turkish authorities have said was ordered by the highest level of Saudi leadership, prompting the kingdom`s biggest political crisis in a generation.

After offering numerous contradictory explanations, Riyadh said Khashoggi was killed and his body dismembered after negotiations to persuade him to return to Saudi Arabia failed.

The kingdom`s public prosecutor is seeking the death penalty for five suspects charged in the murder, but has said Prince Mohammed had no prior knowledge of the operation.

A senior Saudi prince cast doubt upon the reported CIA finding that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month, saying the agency could not be counted on to reach a credible conclusion.

A senior Saudi prince cast doubt upon the reported CIA finding that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last month, saying the agency could not be counted on to reach a credible conclusion. "The CIA is not necessarily the highest standard of veracity or accuracy in assessing situations. The examples of that are multitude," Prince Turki al-Faisal, a senior member of the royal family, told journalists in Abu Dhabi on Saturday. The prince, a former Saudi intelligence chief who has also served as ambassador to the United States, said the agency`s conclusion that Iraq possessed chemical weapons before the US invasion in 2003 showed it could be unreliable. "That was the most glaring of inaccurate and wrong assessments, which led to a full-scale war with thousands being killed," he said, speaking at an event hosted by the New York-based Beirut Institute. "I don`t see why the CIA is not on trial in the United States. This is my answer to their assessment of who is guilty and who is not and who did what in the consulate in Istanbul." The CIA has concluded that Prince Mohammed ordered the operation to kill Khashoggi, as first reported by the Washington Post, and briefed other parts of the US government on its findings, sources told Reuters last week. US President Donald Trump has disputed that the agency reached a conclusion on the murder, saying instead "they have feelings certain ways." A Turkish newspaper also reported on Thursday that CIA director Gina Haspel signaled to Turkish officials that the agency had a recording of a call in which the crown prince gave instructions to "silence" the journalist. Khashoggi was killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2 in an operation that Turkish authorities have said was ordered by the highest level of Saudi leadership, prompting the kingdom`s biggest political crisis in a generation. After offering numerous contradictory explanations, Riyadh said Khashoggi was killed and his body dismembered after negotiations to persuade him to return to Saudi Arabia failed. The kingdom`s public prosecutor is seeking the death penalty for five suspects charged in the murder, but has said Prince Mohammed had no prior knowledge of the operation.

Senior Saudi prince says CIA cannot be trusted on Khashoggi conclusion

Watch: WION Fineprint, 23rd November, 2018

WION Fineprint: Saudis target Turkish products; 4.8 billion dollar bilateral trade at stake

saudi-arabia

Saudi Arabia, News on Saudi Arabia, stories on Saudi Arabia, articles on Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabia stories at Wion, Saudi Arabia news, Saudi Arabia latest news

saudi arabia

Are Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince becoming a liability for the White House?

Gulf rivalries spill onto the soccer pitch

News brief: Big stories of the day

UN chief Guterres calls for 'credible' probe into Khashoggi murder

One of Khashoggi killers said 'I know how to cut' on audio: President Tayyip Erdogan

Senate rebukes Trump on Saudi Arabia, blames prince Salman for Khashoggi murder

Pakistan receives second US $1 billion bailout package from Saudi Arabia

Saudi package would be 'biggest foreign investment' in Pak history: Finance Minister Asad Umar

Standing by Saudi crown prince despite pleas from Senate: Trump

Saudi Arabia is allying with Russia to shore up oil prices as OPEC's power wanes

Saudi Arabia hosts GCC summit amid Qatar tensions, Khashoggi crisis

OPEC to consider PM Modi's call before taking decision

Sean Penn making a film on Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder?

News brief: Big stories of the day

US Senate resolution potentially changes Middle East dynamics

Saudi Crown Prince Salman ordered Khashoggi killing: US senators

Turkey calls for Saudi Arabia to be transparent on Khashoggi investigation

Saudi Arabia works on convincing Russia to join oil cuts

Turkish prosecutors say seek arrest of two Saudi crown prince allies over Khashoggi murder

Kremlin defends Putin-Saudi Crown prince high-five

Khashoggi killing: Turkey's Erdogan demands suspects be handed over

Canada imposes sanctions against Saudi nationals allegedly linked to Khashoggi's murder

Saudi Arabia pledges $50 million to UN Palestinian refugee agency

How Saudi and Qatar are competing over Iraq

US complicity in the Saudi-led genocide in Yemen spans Obama, Trump administrations

What Khashoggi killing means for US-Saudi Nuclear talks