Saudi Arabia arrests 18 men with suspected ISIL links
RIYADH // Saudi security forces have arrested 18 people with suspected ties to cluster cells loyal to ISIL.
The interior ministry yesterday said the 18 were arrested over the past week during raids in the capital, the neighbouring Qasim district and the western cities of Mecca and Medina.
Fifteen of those arrested were Saudi citizens, two were Yemenis and one was Sudanese.
The suspects, all men, are also accused of aiding two extremists who detonated explosive belts after clashing with police on January 21 in the Red Sea city of Jeddah. Security forces seized automatic weapons, knives and more than two million riyals (Dh1.95m) in the raids.
Last month, authorities arrested 13 Pakistanis and three Saudis with suspected links to the same two militants.
After meeting the new United States secretary of state, Rex Tillerson at the G20 summit in Bonn, Germany, yesterday, the Saudi foreign minister Adel Al Jubeir said he was “very, very optimistic” about overcoming the many challenges facing the Middle East and looked forward to working with Donald Trump’s administration. The day before, Mr Trump had jettisoned Washington’s longheld commitment to the eventual creation of a Palestinian state, although Mr Jubeir declined to comment on that decision.
However, Mr Trump’s message has left European countries with even more concerns about America’s foreign policy.
A senior French diplomat said Mr Trump’s remarks – made as Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu stood beside him – made no sense.
“All this makes it difficult for us to understand the decision processes at the heart of the American administration.”