Here’s what’s happened since last week’s updates: Saudi King issues pardons, Crown Prince keeps silence on Khashoggi

Five Saudi officials face the death penalty over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was drugged and dismembered inside the kingdom's Istanbul consulate, Riyadh's public prosecutor said Thursday.

Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and vocal dissident, died after being drugged by the five accused and then dismembered, a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office said in the first Saudi acknowledgement of the manner of his killing. The journalist's body parts were then handed over to an agent outside the consulate grounds, the spokesman said, reported AFP.

Earlier, The Guardian reported that the audio evidence related to the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi contains appalling details of the crime, the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has said, as he continues to pile pressure on the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman.

President Erdoğan’s latest intervention came as the New York Times reported that a member of the Saudi hit team dispatched to Istanbul to kill Khashoggi told one of his superiors by phone to “tell your boss” the operation was accomplished, an apparent reference to Prince Mohammed, and a Turkish newspaper published x-ray images of the team’s luggage, which included defibrillators and syringes.

The audio recordings shocked a Saudi intelligence official, Erdoğan told reporters on his return to Ankara on Monday night from first world war commemorations in France, where he said the killing was discussed with his US, French and German counterparts.

What are your thoughts on these latest developments in the ongoing GCC Crisis? Drop us a line and tell us your thoughts in the comments below, and don’t forget to like and share this article - it keeps us going!

Follow us on our social media channels: @ILQlive @ILQlive @ILoveQtr ILoveQatar

Khadiza Begum

Content Writer

Start a discussion