Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman Gets U.S. Immunity From Trial Over Murder Of Journalist, Khashoggi

Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has been given the US immunity from a lawsuit filed by the fiancée of the murdered journalist, Jamal Khashoggi.

Khashoggi who was a prominent Saudi critic was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018.

At the time, US intelligence said it believes Prince Salman had ordered the killing.

However, in court filings, the US State Department determined that the Saudi Arabia Crown Prince has immunity due to his new role as Saudi Prime Minister.

Lamenting the loss of the suit to secure justice for the murdered journalist following the US determination, BBC quoted Khashoggi’s ex-fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, as saying on Twitter that “Jamal died again today”.

Cengiz, along with the human rights group known as Democracy for the Arab World Now (Dawn), founded by the late Khashoggi had been seeking unspecified damages in the US from the Crown Prince for her fiancée’s murder.

According to the BBC, the complainant had accused Prince Salman and his officials of having “kidnapped, bound, drugged, tortured and assassinated the US-resident journalist and democracy advocate Jamal Khashoggi.”

Reacting to the ruling, the Secretary General of Amnesty International, Agnes Callamard, was quoted as saying that “Today it is immunity. It all adds up to impunity.”