Saudi Arabia pulls out all stops for Trump visit
Longstanding Saudi-US relationship
dubai — Saudi Arabia is making every effort to dazzle and impress President Donald Trump on his first overseas trip, seizing on the visit to cement itself as a major player on the world stage and shove aside Iran.
The kingdom has arranged a dizzying schedule of events for the two days Trump will be in town — inviting figures as varied as Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir, Bret Baier, a host on the Fox News Channel that is popular with Trump and his supporters, and American country singer Toby Keith, who is to perform for a male-only crowd in capital, Riyadh. —
riyadh — Saudi Arabia is hosting a summit between visiting US President Donald Trump and Muslim leaders from around the world.
Trump, on his first foreign trip since taking office in January, will tell Muslim leaders of his “hopes for a peaceful vision of Islam” as he seeks support for the war against radicals, Washington has said.
Muslim leaders may also be looking for Trump to build bridges after allegations of Islamophobia against his administration and its effort to bar travellers from six Muslim-majority countries.
Leaders and representatives of 55 countries — from the southeast Asian sultanate of Brunei to Africa’s Niger and heavyweights including Turkey — have been invited by King Salman for Sunday’s summit with Trump.
The summit will be one of three weekend meetings, as Trump holds bilateral talks with top Saudi officials and with leaders of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) which includes Saudi Arabia.
The bilateral summit on Saturday comes with Saudi leaders rebuilding crucial ties with Washington after feeling that Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama tilted too much towards Tehran.
The 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers including the United States was a major step towards ending Tehran’s international isolation but raised serious concerns in Arab capitals.
Saudi leaders regularly accuse Iran of stirring regional conflicts by supporting sectarian movements in Syria, Iraq and Bahrain as well as in Yemen. Tehran denies the charges.
Iran, which held a presidential election on Friday pitting moderate incumbent Hassan Rohani against hardline jurist Ebrahim Raisi, is also likely to loom large over Sunday’s summit, analysts said.
“This summit has a very clear message to the radical Iranian regime that there will be a global consensus and global agreement between the United States and the Arab and Muslim world,” said Salman Al Ansari, president of the Saudi American Public Relation Affairs Committee (SAPRAC), a private initiative to strengthen Saudi-US ties.
Andreas Krieg, of the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London, said King Salman is trying to use the US to forge a “pan-Islamic alliance under Saudi leadership. —
this summit has a very clear message to the radical Iranian regime Salman Al Ansari, Saudi American Public Relations committee’s president
Here are facts about the longstanding relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States, which has been based on the exchange of American security for Saudi oil: FOUNDING — The discovery of vast oil reserves beneath Saudi sands in the late 1930s secured the kingdom’s place as a vital partner for the energy-hungry United States. The partnership was sealed in 1945 during a historic meeting between then-king Abduaziz bin Saud and US president Franklin D. Roosevelt on board the USS Quincy as it cruised the Suez Canal. WARTIME — When neighbouring Kuwait was invaded in 1990 by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, then-US president George H.W. Bush ordered Operation Desert Storm, which used US airbases in Saudi Arabia as vital staging posts and sent thousands of American troops into the kingdom. TERRORISM — A series of deadly shootings and bombings against foreigners and Saudi security forces that began in 2003 turned Riyadh into a robust partner in the fight against Al Qaeda SYRIA-YEMEN — In 2014, Saudi warplanes joined the US-led coalition fighting militants from the Daesh group in Syria and Iraq. Since early 2015, the kingdom’s military effort has been more focused on Yemen, where it leads an Arab coalition supporting Yemen’s government against Houthi rebels. Washington provides intelligence as well as aerial refuelling to the coalition. REVITALISATION — Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, 31, visited Trump in Washington just two months into the president’s term, while Trump’s CIA director Mike Pompeo, Defence Secretary Jim Mattis and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly have all visited Saudi Arabia this year. TRADE — The US last year exported $18 billion worth of goods to Saudi Arabia and imported goods valued at almost $17 billion. —