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| US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo meets with the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman |
US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia’s crown prince told him he did not know what had happened in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul where dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi went missing two weeks ago.
“Just spoke with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia who totally denied any knowledge of what took place in their Turkish Consulate,” Trump said on Twitter, referring to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Khashoggi, a US resident and leading critic of the crown prince, vanished after entering the Saudi consulate in the city on October 2. Turkish officials say they believe he was murdered there and his body removed, which the Saudis strongly deny.
Trump dispatched US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Riyadh to discuss the Khashoggi disappearance with the leaders of Saudi Arabia, a US friend for decades and an ally against Iran.
Trump wrote on Twitter that the crown prince was with Pompeo during the phone call with the president “and told me that he has already started, and will rapidly expand, a full and complete investigation into this matter. Answers will be forthcoming shortly.”
US media reports say that Riyadh will acknowledge his death in a botched interrogation.
Overnight Monday, Turkish crime scene investigators entered the consulate for the first time since Khashoggi’s disappearance and searched the premises for more than nine hours.
Pompeo met King Salman and Prince Mohammed in Riyadh to discuss the incident, which has caused international outrage and brought renewed attention on the authoritarian kingdom’s human rights record.
He and Prince Mohammed “agreed on the importance of a thorough, transparent, and timely investigation”, US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in Washington.
“The Secretary reiterated the President’s concern with respect to Jamal Khashoggi’s disappearance, as well as the President’s desire to determine what happened,” she said.
Pompeo is expected to go on to Turkey on Wednesday.
In Istanbul, Turkish investigators were expanding their search to include the residence of the Saudi consul and consulate vehicles, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan raised the possibility that parts of the consulate had been repainted since Khashoggi disappeared.
“The investigation is looking into many things such as toxic materials and those materials being removed by painting them over,” he told reporters.
A Turkish security official said no conclusive evidence emerged from the overnight search that indicated Khashoggi was killed in the consulate.
“However, there are some findings and they are being worked on,” he said, adding that painting may have damaged some evidence. “These can’t be fully erased after all, so the teams will continue to work on this.”
Despite the outcry, the case poses a dilemma for the United States, Britain and other Western nations. Saudi Arabia is the world’s top oil exporter and spends lavishly on Western arms. It is also a military ally and an opponent of Iran.
Riyadh has also faced criticism from some Western politicians and human rights groups over the civilian casualties its war planes have caused in the war in Yemen, in which it intervened three years ago.
Indicating unease over the Khashoggi case, international media and business executives are pulling out of an investment conference next week.
Saudi Arabia has said it would retaliate against any pressure or economic sanctions.
CNN said on Monday that after denying for two weeks any role in his disappearance, Saudi Arabia was preparing to say he died in a botched interrogation.
Turkish authorities have an audio recording indicating that Khashoggi was killed in the consulate.
