Khashoggi ‘body double’ on video
Leaked surveillance adds to intrigue over Saudi journalist’s disappearance
ISTANBUL — Just hours after writer Jamal Khashoggi was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, a man strolled out of the diplomatic post apparently wearing the columnist’s clothes as part of a deception to sow confusion over his fate, according to surveillance video leaked Monday.
The new video broadcast by CNN, as well as a progovernment Turkish newspaper’s report that a member of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s entourage made four calls to the royal’s office from the consulate around the same time, put ever-increasing pressure on the kingdom. Meanwhile, Turkish crimescene i nvestigators swarmed a garage Monday night in Istanbul where a Saudi consular vehicle had been parked.
All this came on the eve of Prince Mohammed’s highprofile investment summit in Riyadh, which has seen a raft of the world’s top business leaders decline to attend over the slaying of the writer for The Washington Post.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who said he would not attend the conference, met with the crown prince on Monday night. The Saudi foreign ministry tweeted out a photo of the two men meeting, and U.S. Treasury spokesman Tony Sayegh said in a separate tweet that Mnuchin raised the Kashoggi investigation in his discussions with the crown prince.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has promised that details of Khashoggi’s killing “will be revealed Turkish police secure a garage where authorities found a vehicle belonging to the Saudi Consulate, in Istanbul, on Monday. in all its nakedness” in an address he’ll make before parliament around the same time Tuesday.
The kingdom’s announcement Saturday t hat Khashoggi, who lived in the United States and wrote critically about the Saudi royal family, died in a “fistfight” was met with international skepticism and allegations of a cover-up to absolve the 33- year- old crown prince of direct responsibility.
President Donald Trump said Monday he’s “not satisfied” with the explanations he’s heard about t he Khashoggi’s death and is awaiting reports from U.S. personnel returning from the region.
“We’re going to get to the bottom of it. We have people over in Saudi Arabia now. We have top intelligence people in Turkey. They’re coming back either tonight or tomorrow,” Trump told reporters on the South Lawn of the White House before leaving for a political rally in Texas.
“We’re going to know a lot over the next two days about the Saudi situation,” said Trump. “It’s a very sad thing.”
Trump spoke Sunday with Prince Mohammed, who is the son of Saudi King Salman.
“He says he is not involved nor is the king,” Trump told USA Today in an interview aboard Air Force One on Monday en route to a political rally in Texas. The newspaper said Trump declined to say whether he believed the crown prince’s denials. If their involvement was proven, Trump said: “I would be very upset about it. We’ll have to see.”
The Washington Post reported that CIA Director Gina Haspel departed for Turkey on Monday, which suggests an effort by the U.S. intelligence community to assess the information the Turks have, including what Turkish officials have said is audio that captures the killing.
Intelligence officials are increasingly skeptical of the Saudi account and have warned Trump that the idea that rogue operators flew to Istanbul and killed Khashoggi without the knowledge or consent of Saudi leaders is dubious, a White House official said.
Turkish media reports and officials maintain that a 15-member Saudi team flew to Istanbul on Oct. 2, knowing Khashoggi would enter the consulate to get a document he needed to get married. Once he was inside, the Saudis accosted Khashoggi, cut off his fingers, killed and dismembered the 59-yearold writer, according to Turkish media reports.
Surveillance video on CNN showed the man in Khashoggi’s dress shirt, suit jacket and pants, although he wore a different pair of shoes. It cited a Turkish official as describing the man as a “body double” and a member of the Saudi team sent to Istanbul to target the writer.
The man walks out of the consulate via its back exit with an accomplice, then takes a taxi to Istanbul’s famed Blue Mosque, where he goes to a public bathroom, changes back out of the clothes and leaves. He later eats dinner with his accomplice and goes back to a hotel, where footage shows him smiling and laughing.
The state-run broadcaster TRT later also reported that a man who entered the consulate was seen leaving the building in Khashoggi’s clothes.
In t he days after Khashoggi vanished, Saudi officials initially said he had left the consulate by its back door. The Saudi ambassador to the U.S., Prince Khalid bin Salman, a brother of the crown prince, wrote Oct. 8 that Khashoggi had left, and that claims the kingdom “have detained him or killed him are absolutely false, and baseless.”
By nightfall, Turkish police began searching an underground parking garage in Istanbul’s Sultangazi district. Surveillance footage on TRT showed what Turkish security officials described as suspicious actions, including an image of a man moving a bag from one vehicle to another.
Meanwhile, five Turkish employees of the consulate gave testimony to prosecutors Monday, Turkish media reported. Istanbul’s chief prosecutor had summoned 28 more staff members of the Saudi Consulate, including Turkish citizens and foreign nationals. Some Turkish employees reportedly said they were instructed not to go to work around the time Khashoggi disappeared.