Riyadh touts mega-deals at Saudi’s investment summit

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U.S. TO DEMAND ANSWERS – CIA chief to Turkey

RIYADH, Oct 23, (Agencies): Saudi Arabia’s powerful crown prince Tuesday attended a glitzy investment forum boycotted by a host of global business leaders, as the petro-state admitted it is facing a “crisis” after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman sat in the audience on the opening day of the three-day Future Investment Initiative (FII), which was meant to project the historically insular Gulf Kingdom as a lucrative business destination and set the stage for new ventures and multi-billion dollar contracts. The conference, nicknamed “Davos in the desert”, has been overshadowed by the outcry over the murder of Khashoggi inside the Kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul on Oct 2, with a string of leading international investors pulling out over the case. But Saudi organisers sought to portray it was business as usual, announcing 12 “mega deals” worth more than $50 billion in oil, gas, infrastructure and other sectors. They sought to rally around Prince Mohammed, the king’s powerful son whose reform credentials have been tarnished by the scandal despite repeated denials he had any involvement in the killing, as he made an appearance. But Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih acknowledged “these are difficult days”. “We are going through a crisis,” Falih said in his speech. Falih said the murder of Khashoggi was regrettable, adding that “nobody in the Kingdom can justify it”.

In further efforts to diffuse the crisis, Saudi Arabia’s cabinet said separately that his killers would be held accountable “no matter who they may be”. The comments came as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded to know who gave the order for Khashoggi’s killing in his country and the whereabouts of the slain journalist’s corpse.

The Riyadh conference opened amid tight security at Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton hotel, with Russian Direct Investment Fund chief Kirill Dmitriyev and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan headlining. Falih heaped praise on the CEO of French energy giant Total, Patrick Pouyanne, for standing by Saudi Arabia in this difficult period. “We see what partnership means when you have difficult times,” Pouyanne responded as he shared the stage with Falih. “This is when you really strengthen a partnership.”

Dozens of delegates walked a red carpet into the vast conference venue at the Ritz-Carlton, with a cathedral-like lobby, frescoed ceilings and glittering chandeliers. But as the day progressed, the crowds thinned in the main auditorium, and organisers frequently changed the agenda of the event in a sign speakers were dropping out.

SoftBank Group’s chief executive Masayoshi Son – who maintains close relations with the crown prince – cancelled his speech, Bloomberg reported. A long list of investors and international policymakers have already declined to show up in Riyadh in apparent protest against the Khashoggi killing.

Siemens chief executive Joe Kaeser, corporate chiefs from JP Morgan, Ford and Uber, and media powerhouses like CNN and the Financial Times all scrapped plans to attend.

Ministers from Britain and France and the United States, which have huge defence deals at stake with Saudi Arabia, have stayed away. A wider Western boycott of the conference suggests rising political risks in Saudi Arabia that could hit foreign direct investment, which already plunged to a 14-year low last year, according to a UN body. And in a fresh setback, the forum’s website went down on Monday after an apparent cyberattack.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. It was back up with reduced content as the conference progressed. This year’s conference contrasts with last year’s inaugural FII – a star-studded event at which Prince Mohammed was lionised as a visionary by speakers. But many Western firms have too much at stake to abandon the Arab world’s biggest economy, and some have decided to send lower-level executives. “The West is still interested in the business opportunity that Saudi offers,” Tony Chan, president of Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, who attended the forum. “The no-shows have to be reconciled with that fact. As business shifts from West to East, those companies have to find a balance between maintaining a good PR image and their business considerations.”

Companies from China and Russia have shown little interest in withdrawing from the event, an organiser said. “The high profile withdrawal of so many American CEOs from the conference certainly presents opportunities for Asian and Russian companies to make a splash,” Ellen Wald, author of the book “Saudi Inc”, told AFP. The crown prince, widely known by his initials MBS, faces what the risk consultancy Eurasia Group has called “an acute public relations crisis” over Khashoggi’s murder.

US demands answers
US Vice-President Mike Pence vowed Tuesday to press Saudi Arabia for answers over Khashoggi’s “brutal murder” after Erdogan said the killing inside the Kingdom’s Istanbul consulate was meticulously planned. “The world is watching. The American people want answers and we will demand that those answers are forthcoming,” Pence told an event at The Washington Post, where Khashoggi was a contributing opinion writer.

Erdogan, in his most extensive public remarks since Khashoggi’s disappearance upon entering the consulate on Oct 2, called on Saudi Arabia to extradite suspects to Turkey to face justice over the writer’s death. “The word from President Erdogan this morning that this brutal murder was premeditated, pre-planned days in advance flies in the face of earlier assertions that had been made by the Saudi regime,” Pence said. “It underscores the determination of our administration to find out what happened,” he said.

The strongly worded remarks come after days of mixed messages by US President Donald Trump, who has vowed punishment but also ruled out major actions such as stopping arms sales to Saudi Arabia, a longstanding US ally. Pence, whose administration routinely criticizes the media, called Khashoggi’s death “an assault on a free and independent press, and our administration is determined to use all means at our disposal to get to the bottom of it.” “We’re going to demand that those responsible are held accountable and once we have all the facts President Trump will make the decision based upon the values of the American people and our vital national interests,” he said. CIA Director Gina Haspel travelled to Turkey on Monday to help investigate the death of Khashoggi, two sources familiar with the matter said. Khashoggi, who was living in Washington, disappeared after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on Oct 2 to get documents for his forthcoming marriage. Earlier on Monday, Trump said he was still not satisfied with what he had heard from Saudi Arabia about the killing.

PM backs Saudi
Lebanon’s premier-designate Saad Hariri threw his support behind Saudi Arabia Tuesday as it faces outrage over the murder of Saudi journalist and government critic Khashoggi at its Istanbul consulate.

Hariri’s comments came less than a year after he resigned in mysterious circumstances in a televised address from the Saudi capital, sparking rumours he was being held there against his will. “The measures taken by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia regarding the case of Khashoggi … come within the framework that serves the path of justice and the disclosure of the whole truth,” a statement from his office quoted him as saying.

Hariri said the directives of “King Salman bin Abdulaziz would put things in the right direction and contribute to respond to the malicious campaigns targeting the Kingdom”, the statement said. Crime scene investigators have found two suitcases which contained personal belongings of Khashoggi during a search of a Saudi consulate vehicle in Istanbul, broadcaster CNN Turk reported on Tuesday. A Reuters witness said a Saudi team was accompanying the Turkish investigators as they carried out the search in a car park where the vehicle was found in Istanbul’s Sultangazi district on Monday.

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