News Analysis |
In a historic move, the U.S Senate has passed a non-abiding resolution in which it was urged that the United States of America must pull out its troops and support for the war in Yemen and held Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman directly responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. A house controlled by the Republicans underwent unprecedented development with the final count of 56-41, where some of Donald Trump’s Republican colleagues favored the bill.
The president of the United States of America Donald Trump has stood behind the Kingdom after the Khashoggi murder even when Saudi Arabia was at its weakest at diplomatic standing for a long time. The bill is likely to pass from the House of Representatives as well when the Democrats would eventually hold the majority following their victory in the mid-term elections, but President Trump has vowed to veto the bill which ruined any chance of it becoming a law.
“It is absolutely essential to have a credible investigation and to have the punishment of those that were guilty,” Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, said at a conference in Doha.
Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, has strongly condemned the bill, terming it as interference in the internal issues of the Kingdom. “The kingdom condemns the latest position of the US Senate that was based on unsubstantiated allegations and rejects the blatant interference in its internal affairs,” the foreign ministry said in a statement released by the official Saudi Press Agency.
The Saudi ministry warned that the kingdom would not tolerate any “disrespect” of its rulers. “This position by the US Senate sends the wrong messages to all those who want to cause a rift in Saudi-US relationship,” the ministry said.
The resolution has surfaced at a time when both the countries are officially moving ahead with a plan of a formal military alliance for the stability of the Middle East against the substantial security threats. Analysts largely agree that the underlining factor behind the military collusion is to limit Iran’s access to proxy and conventional means to cause turbulence for both Saudi Arabia and the USA.
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“The aim is to achieve security arrangements in the Middle East that can protect the region from external aggression… and strengthen relations between the United States and the countries of the region,” Foreign Minister of Saudi Arabia Adel Al-Jubeir said in a statement. Due to the non-abiding nature of the resolution passed by the U.S Senate, the relations between both the countries are to remain unaffected.
Though, it might increase the pressure on President Donald Trump, as the next stop for the bill is the Democrat-controlled House of Representative. And since it is just a year for the next U.S presidential elections to commence where Donald Trump must be eyeing at another 4 years in the Oval Office, he might feel the need to weigh the public opinion vis-à-vis Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.
A house controlled by the Republicans underwent unprecedented development with the final count of 56-41, where some of Donald Trump’s Republican colleagues favored the bill.
United Nations itself has called for a thorough and neutral probe into the case of Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi who was murdered inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. Saudi Arabia has brushed the operation as rouge one carried out by the culprits on their own while the world has refused to accept the narrative.
“It is absolutely essential to have a credible investigation and to have the punishment of those that were guilty,” Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, 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.
Turkey has repeatedly formally asked the Saudi government to extradite those involved in the murder which has been declined. It was, in fact, Turkey which hinted at the UN level investigation into the matter when Mevlut Cavusoglu, a Turkish minister, said that Turkey will not give up on this, ‘we will go to the end’.
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The murder has already resulted in the form of sanctions coming from Canada, France, and the United States of America over 20 Saudi nationals and is likely to continue to haunt Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman in future as well.