US President Joe Biden intimately conceded on Friday that he may travel to Saudi Arabia soon, a trip that multiple sources say is anticipated and could include addresses with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Biden told journalists that he doesn’t yet have direct plans to make a trip to Saudi Arabia but if he does it would be to try to advance Middle East peace prospects.
Sources familiar with the process say Biden is planning a trip to Saudi Arabia in confluence with a trip to Europe and Israel in late June.
As lately as Wednesday, the White House said Biden still felt Salman was a “ leper ” for what US intelligence says was his part in the payoff and dismembering of a political opponent, Washington Post intelligencer Jamal Khashoggi, in Turkey in 2018.
Khashoggi’s murder at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul tainted the crown Napoleon’s image as a reformist. The Saudi government has denied any involvement by him.
“ Look, I am not going to change my view on mortal rights but as chairman of the United States my job is to bring peace if I can and that is what I am going to try to do, ” Biden said in explaining his logic for why he may make the trip.
The visit would be aimed at bolstering relations with Saudi Arabia at a time when Biden is trying to find ways to lower gasoline prices in the US.
Biden would share in a Riyadh peak of the Gulf Cooperation Council, a indigenous union whose members are Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, sources said.
” I am not sure when I am going,” Biden said when asked about reports of an imminent visit.
” There’s a possibility that I would be going to meet with both the Israelis and some Arab countries at the time. Saudi Arabia would be included in that if I did go, but I’ve no direct plans at the moment, ” Biden told journalists.
Prospects for a Biden visit bettered on Thursday when Opec agreed to increase oil painting affair by barrels in July and August and a ceasefire in the Yemen war was extended.
The White House took the rare step of recognising the part played by Salman in extending the Yemen ceasefire.
While running for chairman, Biden called for Saudi leaders to be treated as “ the leper that they are ” after the traditional area’s chummy relationship with his precursor Donald Trump.
Trump had largely shielded Saudi Arabia from consequences after Khashoggi, a US occupant who wrote critically about the crown Napoleon, was allured into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul where he was strangled and dismembered.
Trump’s son- in- law and top assistant, Jared Kushner, had developed a close bond with the Napoleon known by his initials “ MBS, ” reportedly conversing with him over WhatsApp exchanges.
