Hand over your hit squad

Saudis pressured to give up Khashoggi killers

ANKARA: Turkey has intensified its demands for Saudi Arabia to extradite 18 suspects in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a call likely to be resisted by the kingdom and could escalate tensions between the US-allied powers.

Khashoggi’s Turkish fiancee has also given a tearful TV interview in which she said she kept asking herself if she should have stopped her partner entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2.

The Istanbul chief prosecutor’s office submitted a request for Saudi Arabia to hand over the suspects and that Turkey’s Foreign Ministry would formally notify the kingdom.

The Saudi government has said it arrested and would itself punish 18 people for what it described as a rogue operation by officials who killed Khashoggi.

“We expect our request … to be fulfilled because this atrocious event took place in Turkey,” Turkish Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul said.

Turkish prosecutors want the suspects to face prosecution for “premeditated killing executed with fiendish sentiments or by causing torment”.

“The reasoning behind the extradition request is that Jamal Khashoggi was murdered in Turkey by Saudi nationals who travelled to Turkey for this specific purpose,” a senior Turkish official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “The court proceedings in Turkey will be open to international observers in order to ensure the greatest level of transparency.”

Turkey alleges a 15-member squad was sent to Istanbul to kill the journalist, once a Saudi insider who became a critic of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and was a columnist for The Washington Post.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the three others in the group of 18 detained in Saudi Arabia were consulate employees.

Mr Erdogan said Turkey would soon reveal more evidence about the killing and re- peated a demand that the Saudis must reveal the location of Khashoggi’s body.

Khashoggi’s fiancee Hatice Cengiz told the Haberturk news channel she accompanied Khashoggi who was 59, to the consulate and was outside while, she thought, he was getting paperwork for their planned marriage. He never came out. “I still have questions that I cannot answer,” she said.

“Did I miss something? Did I not notice something?”