Biden to travel to Saudi Arabia, ending nation’s “pariah” status

WASHINGTON » President Joe Biden, who as a candidate vowed to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” in response to the assassination of a prominent dissident, has decided to travel to its capital, Riyadh, this month to rebuild relations with the oil-rich kingdom at a time when he is seeking to lower gas prices at home and isolate Russia abroad.

While the logistics and timing were being worked out, Biden planned to add the visit to a scheduled trip to Europe and Israel, administration officials said. During his stop in Riyadh, he will meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who was deemed responsible for the assassination, as well as the leaders of other Arab nations, including Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates.

The visit represents the triumph of realpolitik over moral outrage, according to foreign policy experts. In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Biden finds it necessary to court other energy producers to replace oil from Moscow and stabilize world markets. The group of oil-producing nations called OPEC+, led by Saudi Arabia, announced Thursday that they would increase production modestly in July and August, and American officials expect them to do more in autumn, but it may not be enough to bring down prices at the pump before November’s congressional elections.

The Biden administration has been increasing cooperation with Saudi Arabia on a variety of issues in recent months, particularly in seeking an end to the 8year-old Saudi-led war in neighboring Yemen. A 2month-old truce was extended Thursday, and Biden praised Saudi leaders for their role. “Saudi Arabia demonstrated courageous leadership by taking initiatives early on to endorse and implement terms of the U.n.-led truce,” he said in a statement.

The diplomacy and the president’s trip represent an effort to repair the rupture in relations stemming from the brutal 2018 killing of Jamal Khashoggi, a wellknown critic of the Saudi government and a columnist for The Washington Post. U.S. intelligence concluded that Crown Prince Mohammed ordered the hit.

While former President Donald Trump retained close relations with the Saudis, Biden promised to take a different tack if elected to the White House. He said that he would make the Saudis “pay the price, and make them in fact the pariah that they are,” while saying there was “very little social redeeming value in the present government in Saudi Arabia.”