Pressure grows to release jailed prince

A US$2mil (RM8.6mil) US lobbying effort and petitions from European lawmakers are piling pressure on Saudi Arabia to release a philanthropist prince jailed for two years without charge amid an intensifying royal crackdown.

The detention of Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz and his father since January 2018 is part of a clampdown under de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that has ensnared not just potential rivals but also figures posing no visible challenge to his hold on power.

The dangerous power plays have also swept up family members of Saad Aljabri, a former aide to another detained prince and top intelligence official, who fled to Canada and holds key state secrets.

The most unlikely target is Salman, a multilingual 37-year-old educated at Paris’ Sorbonne University, who apparently espoused no political ambitions and earned a reputation of being a “walking blank cheque” for funding development projects in poor countries.

“This is not just an unlawful arrest,” said an associate of the prince.

“This is daylight kidnapping. This is a forced disappearance.”

After being detained for around a year in the high-security Al-Ha’ir prison near Riyadh and later in a private villa with his father Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the prince was moved to a secret detention site in March, multiple sources said.

He was mysteriously returned to the villa last week to be reunited with his father, three of those sources said.

It remains unclear why he was moved to the secret site.

His telephone calls to his family are monitored by Saudi intelligence, the sources said.

But his return may be a tentative sign that international pressure for his release is working.

A delegation from the European Parliament implored Saudi authorities to release detained royals including Salman during a visit to Riyadh in February, according to a source and an internal report of the tour seen by AFP.

“The European Parliament already asked for information about the case in a letter addressed ... to the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, which (remains) unanswered,” Marc Tarabella, a vice-chairman of the parliament’s delegation for relations with the Arab peninsula, wrote to the European Commission.

“I would like to ask you to raise this issue ... with the highest relevant authorities in Saudi Arabia appealing for Prince Salman’s release,” he wrote.

Separately, leading Washington lobbyist Robert Stryk’s Sonoran Policy Group signed a US$2mil contract in May to advocate for the prince’s release “with the governments of the United States, United Kingdom, France, and the European Union”, according to a US justice department filing seen by AFP.

The international effort is a gamble that could backfire in a kingdom whose authoritarian rulers are strongly averse to public criticism.

But as private appeals to the rulers go unheeded, the campaign may be the only hope at a time when the kingdom is grappling with an economic slump and amid unease in Washington with Mohammed’s aggressive policies.

This is not just an unlawful arrest. This is daylight kidnapping.

Prince Salman’s associate