Pompeo presses Saudi crown prince for accountability in Khashoggi slaying

Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo on Monday pressed the Saudi crown prince to hold accountable “every single person” involved in the murder of U.S.-based Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in an episode that has strained U.S. relations with the kingdom.

The Saudi leadership reiterated its commitment to punishing the killers, Pompeo said, but still has to “work through a fact process.” More than 100 days have passed since Khashoggi was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, and many critics, journalist advocates, and human-rights activists have accused Riyadh of fingering some scapegoats but avoiding blaming the masterminds. The U.S intelligence community concluded that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, likely ordered the killing.

But the Trump administration has made clear it values the bilateral U.S.Saudi relationship, including arms deals, over an individual human-rights case.

Pompeo met with the crown prince, much of it one-on-one, for about 45 minutes inside the ornate Royal Court palace, his second such sit-down since Khashoggi’s death.

Speaking later to reporters at Riyadh’s King Khalid airport, Pompeo downplayed the harm caused to U.S.-Saudi relations by the Khashoggi case. “Our relationship is with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” he said. “That is the strategic partnership.”

A bipartisan bloc of U.S. lawmakers has demanded the administration suspend arms sales to Saudi Arabia over its abysmal humanrights record and the Saudiled, U.S.-backed Yemen war, which has killed tens of thousands of civilians and plunged the country into famine and a humanitarian crisis.