The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Turkey demands Saudis reveal who ordered Khashoggi killing
ISTANBUL — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday that Turkey had uncovered further evidence in the killing of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, pressing Saudi Arabia to reveal who gave the orders and demanding that its leaders explain what happened to Khashoggi’s body.
“There is more information,” Erdogan said at a gathering in the capital, Ankara, and suggested he might make more evidence public in the future. “But beyond all else, who gave the order?”
Khashoggi’s Turkish fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, said in a television interview Friday that he had been relaxed and hopeful when he entered the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2 to pick up a document that would allow them to marry. He was killed inside the consulate by a team of men from Saudi Arabia.
In an emotional interview that lasted more than an hour — her first television interview since his death — Cengiz described how she met and became engaged to Khashoggi, a critic of the kingdom’s lead- ership who wrote opinion pieces for The Washington Post, and how she put out the alarm when he did not emerge from the consulate. His first meeting at the consulate several days earlier had been courteous, so he had few qualms going back, she said. “He did not hesitate at all.”
As hours passed a nd Khashoggi did not reappear, Cengiz said, she thought he was enjoying chatting with the consular staff. It was only when she realized the con- sulate had closed for the day that she felt a great feeling of dread and asked the guards where he was.
“It never occurred to me something like that would be done to a person like Jamal Khashoggi, who was embraced by the world, who spent his life working for his country to develop, to improve; a patriot, a nation- alist, who never ever did any harm to anyone,” she said.
After weeks of insisting that Khashoggi had left the building alive, Saudi Arabia buckled under pressure from Turkey and acknowledged a week ago that he was killed, though officials insisted that his death had been an accident. The kingdom’s official story changed yet again Thurs- day, when a state prosecutor said the killing had been premeditated.
The nature of the killing of Khashoggi has led many West- ern analysts, intelligence offi- cials and elected leaders to suggest that it could not have been carried out without the approval of the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Sal- man, the country’s de facto ruler and a crucial ally of the White House. Saudi Arabia has insisted that no one high in the royal family knew of the operation in advance or sanctioned it, though it has acknowledged that high rank- ing aides close to the crown prince were involved.
Pushing back against West- ern calls to cut off arms sales or impose other sanctions, Saudi Arabia on Friday tacitly threatened that it could look instead to support from Moscow.
King Salman of Saudi Arabia spoke by telephone with Russian President Vladimir Putin about the Khashoggi case on Thursday, according to statements from both governments. On Friday, a Krem- lin spokesman expressed confidence in the official Saudi investigation and account of the case — remarks that were extensively covered by Russian and Saudi news media.
“There is no reason that would lead anyone not to believe Saudi Arabia’s announcements,” said the spokesman, Dmitry Peskov.
have heard the royal family’s statement condemn- ing this murder,” he said. “But everything else comes down to the investigations the royal family ordered, and we support all of it.”
The manager of a Russian government investment fund, Kirill Dmitriev, was the only European government offi- cial to play a high-profile role in the Saudi investment conference hosted this week by Prince Mohammed. Many American and European officials and businessmen dropped out of the event because of the uproar over Khashoggi’s death.
The CIA director, Gina Haspel, visited Turkey this week and, according to Turkish pro-government news- papers, was presented with evidence gathered by Turk- ish investigators, including audio recordings of the killing.
Cengiz said she had received telephone calls from both President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo but drew little comfort from them. Trump’s invitation to visit the White House was “a sentence uttered to earn the sympathy of the pub- lic,” she said.
Erdogan said on Friday that Turkey had shared evidence with those who had asked to see it but had retained the original material. Those who have seen the evidence were “surprised,” he added.
Erdogan said the killer was among the 15 Saudi agents who traveled to Turkey hours before Khashoggi arrived at the Saudi Consulate.
“Actually, the perpetrator is certain. And something else comes up, who is the one giving the orders?” Erdogan said. “On whose order did those 15 come to Istanbul on Friday? The authorities should explain this.”