Category Archives: King Salman

Arrested Saudi royals allegedly aimed to block crown prince’s accession

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King’s brother and former crown prince accused of trying to sideline Mohammed bin Salman

The dramatic arrests of two leading Saudi royals followed discussions between the two men about using a procedural body, led by one of them, to block the accession to the throne of the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, if the current monarch dies or becomes incapacitated.

Three sources have confirmed to the Guardian that the arrests of Prince Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz, the sole remaining full brother of King Salman, and the former crown prince, Mohammed bin Nayef, on Friday were ordered after details of alleged conversations were passed to the royal court.

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Saudi Arabia seals off Shia Qatif region over coronavirus fears

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Only essential services will be allowed to operate in area home to 500,000 people

Saudi Arabia has cordoned off an oil-rich Shia region, suspended air and sea travel to nine countries and closed schools and universities, in a series of measures to contain the fast-spreading coronavirus.

Related: Saudi Arabia releases images of King Salman after purge of royals

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Saudi Arabia releases images of King Salman after purge of royals

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Monarch seen carrying out duties as speculation mounts over crown prince’s succession

Saudi monarch King Salman was pictured carrying out official duties on Sunday, two days after his brother and the former heir to his throne were arrested in a sweep that sparked a new wave of palace intrigue and speculation about his health.

Photographs released by the Saudi royal court showed the 84-year-old king receiving several ambassadors and reading through correspondence. The images doused claims that the detention on Friday of Prince Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz and Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who was ousted as Crown Prince two years ago, heralded an imminent change of ruler.

The move came as two other princes who had also been arrested were freed late on Sunday. A source confirmed that both Prince Abdul Aziz bin Saud bin Nayef and Prince Saud bin Nayef had been questioned by royal court aides since being seized from their homes on Friday.

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Saudi Arabia detains three royal family members in latest crackdown

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Royal relatives accused of plotting to oust King Salman and successor Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman

Saudi authorities have detained three royal family members including two senior princes, according to US media reports, signalling the crown prince is further tightening his grip on power.

Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, a brother of King Salman, and the monarch’s nephew Prince Mohammed bin Nayef were taken from their homes early on Friday by royal guards after being accused of treason, the Wall Street Journal reported citing unnamed sources. The pair were allegedly plotting to oust King Salman and the son he has designated to succeed him, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, it reported.

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‘Click I agree’: the UN rapporteur says prince tried to intimidate Bezos with message

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Information suggests alleged targeting of Amazon chief was part of a wider campaign to pick off individuals close to Khashoggi

The message, it seems, could not have been clearer.

On 8 November 2018, just one month after the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest man, received an unsolicited text from Mohammed bin Salman’s WhatsApp account.

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UN experts demand US inquiry into Jeff Bezos Saudi hacking claims

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‘Grave concern’ expressed at evidence of possible ‘effort to silence Washington Post’

UN experts are demanding an immediate investigation by the US into evidence indicating that Jeff Bezos, the billionaire owner of the Washington Post, was hacked with spyware deployed in a WhatsApp message sent from the personal account of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman.

The special rapporteurs – Agnès Callamard and David Kaye – said in a joint statement they were “gravely concerned” by evidence they had reviewed about the apparent surveillance of Bezos in what they described as a possible “effort to influence, if not silence, the Washington Post’s reporting on Saudi Arabia”.

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Bidding for ‘milestone’ sale of Aramco shares set for next week

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State-owned Saudi oil giant said it will provide the final offer price on 5 December

Bidding for shares in the world’s most profitable company will start in one week, it has been announced. Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil giant, said it plans to provide the final offer price, precise number and percentage of shares on 5 December.

Its prospectus, released on Saturday night, showed profits of $68.2bn (£53.3bn) for the first six months of this financial year, but did not include any indication of the value the Saudi government hopes to achieve.

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Russian shadow falls over Syria as Kurds open door for Assad

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With the US gone, the implications of their departure is beginning to sink in across the Middle East

The moment that changed the Middle East arrived with a sudden silence. Just before 7pm on Sunday, the internet was cut across north-eastern Syria where, for half an hour, the Kurds of the region had been digesting a news flash. The Syrian government was returning to two towns, Manbij and Kobane. The implication quickly sunk in.

The regional capital, Qamishli, soon emptied; streets that had bustled with minibuses and shoppers became eerie and still. With the internet down phones were no help and nor were officials who had vanished along with the traffic. Air seemed to be suddenly vacuumed from the city, and the few people still around knew exactly what it meant: this was the moment power changed hands. It was a time to be scared.

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Iran threatens ‘all-out war’ if action taken over Saudi oil strike

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Foreign minister’s comments further inflame tensions in Persian Gulf after oil attacks

Iran’s foreign minister has warned that any attack on his country after a series of missile strikes on Saudi Arabia’s oil industry would result in “all-out war”.

Javad Zarif also demanded that Riyadh hand over the evidence that it claimed proved the attack came from Iran, and not from Houthi-occupied Yemen.

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Saudi king names son Abdulaziz to key post of energy minister

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Abdulaziz bin Salman becomes first Saudi royal to head energy ministry, one of the country’s most vital roles

Saudi Arabia’s King Salman has replaced the country’s energy minister with one of his sons, naming Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman to one of the most important positions in the kingdom.

The new energy minister is an older half-brother to the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and an experienced oil industry figure in Saudi Arabia. He has been minister of state for energy affairs since 2017. The two brothers are not known to be close.

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Saudi women can now travel without male guardian’s approval – report

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Okaz newspaper reports key step in dismantling strict controls over nation’s women

Women in Saudi Arabia will no longer need the permission of a male guardian to travel, according to local news reports. The policy, if confirmed, would mark a key step in dismantling controls that have made women second-class citizens in their own country.

Saudi women over the age of 21 will be able to apply for a passport and travel outside the country, without approval, Okaz newspaper reported on Thursday. The change would put them on an equal footing with men. They would also reportedly be able to register births and deaths, a right previously restricted to men.

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The Guardian view on Jamal Khashoggi’s murder: Saudi Arabia and its friends | Editorial

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One way to honour Khashoggi is to celebrate his life. Another is to recognise the lessons of his death

The UN report into October’s murder of Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul is the fullest account yet of events and as horrifying as one would expect. Agnes Callamard, the special rapporteur, describes a “deliberate, premeditated execution”; secretly recorded conversations before his visit discussed the arrival of the “sacrificial animal” and dismemberment of a body. She concludes that the crown prince of Saudi Arabia should be investigated because there is “credible evidence” that he and other senior officials are liable for the killing – a conclusion also reached by the CIA – despite the kingdom’s insistence that it was a rogue operation.

No reminder should be needed of the brutality of the killing of Khashoggi, a widely respected journalist living in Washington. Even Saudi Arabia’s business and diplomatic allies blanched, or at least felt obliged to put some distance between themselves and the crown prince Mohammed bin Salman. The kingdom, after repeated lies about what happened, announced that it would try 11 suspects for his murder.

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Qatari PM to attend Saudi Arabia summit after two-year blockade

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Gulf Cooperation Council will meet to discuss Iran’s alleged role in Gulf drone attacks

A possible US-backed thaw in Qatari-Saudi relations has been signalled by Qatari diplomats travelling to Saudi Arabia to lay the ground for their country’s attendance at a major summit in Mecca on alleged Iranian aggression in the region.

Qatar’s attendance will be seen as the biggest rapprochement between the two countries since the Saudis launched a sweeping economic and political blockade against the gas-rich country two years ago, accusing Doha of trying to undermine Saudi Arabia, fund terrorism and promote the Muslim Brotherhood across the Middle East.

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The Guardian view on Libya: this crisis is international | Editorial

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Khalifa Haftar’s foreign backers have egged him on – and civilians are paying the price

The warlord Khalifa Haftar, who controls eastern Libya, has never disguised his ambitions. Once one of Muammar Gaddafi’s generals, he returned from exile in the US when the dictator fell in 2011, attempted to launch a coup three years later, repeatedly declared his intention to take Tripoli and has said that his country may not be ready for democracy.

So the professions of shock from his backers when he mounted his assault on the western capital, held by the internationally recognised Government of National Accord, cannot be treated with great seriousness. The only real surprise about his advance was its timing. By moving while the UN secretary-general was in the country, to discuss arrangements for a UN-organised conference intended to lead to elections, he destroyed muted hopes of a political solution and underscored his already evident contempt for the process. As the prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, complained, the response of many supposed allies was silence.

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US-Saudi dual citizens among eight critics of regime detained

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First arrests since Jamal Khashoggi killing include women’s rights activists

Saudi Arabia has launched a fresh round of arrests of activists and critics, many of them supporters of jailed civil rights campaigners, in an apparent rebuff to mounting international pressure over its treatment of dissidents.

Eight people, including two US-Saudi citizens, were detained on Thursday in the first such sweep of perceived critics of the country’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, since the killing of writer Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October.

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Leaked reports reveal severe abuse of Saudi political prisoners

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Exclusive: cuts, burns and bruising documented, despite government denials of torture

Political prisoners in Saudi Arabia are said to be suffering from malnutrition, cuts, bruises and burns, according to leaked medical reports that are understood to have been prepared for the country’s ruler, King Salman.

The reports seem to provide the first documented evidence from within the heart of the royal court that political prisoners are facing severe physical abuse, despite the government’s denials that men and women in custody are being tortured.

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Saudi crown prince allegedly stripped of some authority

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Series of Mohammed bin Salman no-shows at high-profile meetings fed claims of rift with king

The heir to the Saudi throne has not attended a series of high-profile ministerial and diplomatic meetings in Saudi Arabia over the last fortnight and is alleged to have been stripped of some of his financial and economic authority, the Guardian has been told.

The move to restrict, if only temporarily, the responsibilities of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is understood to have been revealed to a group of senior ministers earlier last week by his father, King Salman.

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Rumours grow of rift between Saudi king and crown prince

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King Salman said to have been angered by recent moves by Prince Mohammed against him

There are growing signs of a potentially destabilising rift between the king of Saudi Arabia and his heir, the Guardian has been told.

King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman are understood to have disagreed over a number of important policy issues in recent weeks, including the war in Yemen.

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