Saudi prince has immunity over Khashoggi murder, says US

PRESIDENT Joe Biden has been accused of shielding Mohammed bin Salman after the US justice department ruled that Saudi Arabia’s crown prince had immunity from prosecution over the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

Mr Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was killed and dismembered by a Saudi hit squad in the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate in 2018, in an operation the CIA concluded was likely to have been ordered by Prince Mohammed, who has been the de facto Saudi leader for several years.

Hatice Cengiz, Mr Khashoggi’s fiancée, who brought a civil case against Prince Mohammed in a US district court, expressed despair after the US Justice Department ruled that he had sovereign immunity as an acting head of state.

“Jamal died again today,” she said on Twitter yesterday after the ruling, which is likely to lead Judge John Bates to dismiss her lawsuit.

Democracy for Arab World Now, an advocacy group co-founded by Mr Khashoggi, which was a co-plaintiff, said the ruling undermined Mr Biden’s promise to make a pariah of MBS, as the crown prince is commonly known.

The US Justice Department “determined that defendant Bin Salman, as the sitting head of a foreign government, enjoys head-of-state immunity from the jurisdiction of US courts as a result of that office”.

“The doctrine of head-of-state immunity is well established in customary international law,” Justice Department lawyers ruled.

The White House said the ruling had “nothing to do with the bilateral relationship with Saudi Arabia”.