{"id":1392,"date":"2022-12-09T02:16:46","date_gmt":"2022-12-09T02:16:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/?p=1392"},"modified":"2023-05-16T07:16:59","modified_gmt":"2023-05-16T07:16:59","slug":"us-judge-dismisses-case-against-saudi-crown-prince-over-khashoggi-killing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/us-judge-dismisses-case-against-saudi-crown-prince-over-khashoggi-killing\/","title":{"rendered":"US judge dismisses case against Saudi crown prince over Khashoggi killing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A US judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia\u2019s\u00a0Mohammed bin Salman\u00a0that claimed he conspired to kill journalist Jamal Khashoggi, saying the crown prince was entitled to sovereign immunity despite \u201ccredible allegations\u201d that he was involved in the murder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Crown<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Judge John Bates, a US district court judge with a long history of presiding over cases involving national security, acknowledged \u201cuneasiness\u201d in making the decision, but said that his hands were in effect tied by\u00a0the Biden administration\u2019s recent recommendation\u00a0that Prince Mohammed be given immunity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The decision to dismiss the civil claim, which was brought by Khashoggi\u2019s fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, and Dawn, a pro-democracy group founded by the murdered journalist, likely marks the end of efforts to hold the future Saudi king accountable for the 2018 murder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dismissal of the civil claim against Prince Mohammed and two of his close associates \u2013 Saud al-Qahtani and Ahmed al-Asiri \u2013 means the Saudi heir can now travel to the US and other jurisdictions freely. Although the case was not brought by US prosecutors with the power to arrest him, if it had been allowed to proceed, the case would have created a legal minefield for the crown prince and if he had been found guilty, could have put his financial interests in the US in jeopardy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne episode in our struggle for justice for Jamal may have concluded but the battle will never be over until all perpetrators including MBS are brought to justice,\u201d said Abdullah Alaoudh, research director for\u00a0Saudi Arabia\u00a0at Dawn, a co-plaintiff in the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saudi dissidents and critics of Prince Mohammed have previously expressed grave concerns about any possibility of the crown prince being granted immunity, saying any such decision would seal\u00a0the aura of impunity around the 37-year-old prince, and could be seen as offering him a license to target other journalists and dissidents around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khashoggi\u2019s brutal murder in 2018 created an international outcry. An investigation by Agnes Callamard, then the UN\u2019s special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, found that Khashoggi had been the victim of a \u201cdeliberate, premeditated execution\u201d for which the state of Saudi Arabia was responsible under human rights law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using recordings of conversations from inside Saudi\u2019s Istanbul consulate where he was\u00a0murdered and dismembered with a bone saw, Callamard reported that Khashoggi had been confronted in his final moments by Saudi officials, including one who said: \u201cWe are coming to get you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the minutes that followed, her report found, a struggle could be heard, and rustling plastic, suggesting the Washington Post columnist may have been suffocated using a plastic bag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Jamal<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In an angry statement to the Guardian, Callamard, who is now director general of Amnesty International, listed multiple parties who she claimed had \u201ccontributed to the impunity for the state murder of Jamal Khashoggi\u201d, from Saudi Arabia itself, to President Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan in Turkey, to Joe Biden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnd I am not mentioning all the governments, and the heads of businesses, sporting and cultural events who courted, sold and bought from the state responsible for murdering Jamal Khashoggi. This is the reality of our world. Press freedom and human rights betrayed. Repeatedly. But still we stand. And still we fight. And we are not defeated. We know the truth,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prince Mohammed has said he takes responsibility for the murder but has denied any personal involvement in approving the killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Judge Bates\u2019s ruling comes years after then-candidate Biden promised that he would hold the Saudi crown prince accountable for the murder if he was elected president and suggested that Prince Mohammed ought to be treated as a \u201cglobal pariah\u201d for his alleged role in the killing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortly after entering the White House, it appeared that Biden would follow through on the campaign promise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His administration released an unclassified intelligence report that concluded that \u201cMBS\u201d, as he is known, had likely approved the killing. But no further sanctions against the crown prince or his vast business interests in the US followed. Last summer,\u00a0Biden fist-bumped the crown prince\u00a0ahead of a meeting in Jeddah that was seen as an attempt to rescue the relationship. Then, last month,\u00a0the state department suggested\u00a0that Prince Mohammed be granted immunity, citing a recent promotion of the crown prince to the role of prime minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Human rights defenders and Cengiz\u2019s own lawyers said the promotion had been a ruse intended solely for the purpose of escaping accountability, an allegation that neither the Biden administration nor the court denied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In his decision, Judge Bates stressed that US law and separation of powers, which forces the judiciary to show deference to executive branch opinions on foreign immunity, compelled him to agree with the Biden administration\u2019s decision on the case, even though he seemed to acknowledge that the circumstances around Prince Mohammed\u2019s sudden elevation to prime minister were \u201csuspect\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Executive Branch remains responsible for foreign affairs, including with Saudi Arabia, and a contrary decision on bin Salman\u2019s immunity by this court would unduly interfere with those responsibilities all the same,\u201d the judge wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A US judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia\u2019s\u00a0Mohammed bin Salman\u00a0that claimed he conspired to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1392"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1394,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1392\/revisions\/1394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whatistandfor.co\/fightingcorruptionandworkriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}