ANKARA (Middle East Eye) – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plans to visit Saudi Arabia later this week after years of tensions in relations between the two countries over the 2018 murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, three sources familiar with the trip told Middle East Eye.
Speaking anonymously, the sources said the visit was planned for Thursday, but scheduling issues could delay it to next month.
Turkey met one of the key Saudi demands in repairing relations earlier this month by deciding to hand the Khashoggi trial to Saudi Arabia, a case involving 26 suspects linked to his killing.
The 59-year-old Washington Post columnist was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018, in a gruesome murder that shocked the world.
Ankara-Riyadh relations worsened significantly after the killing, but Turkey has since sought to mend ties with Saudi Arabia as part of a new regional policy to bolster its economy.
A U.S. intelligence report released a year ago said Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had approved the operation to kill or capture Khashoggi, but the Saudi government has denied any involvement by the crown prince and rejects the report’s findings.
“For MBS, it’s all about Khashoggi. He is obsessed by it. It’s personal,” one source, who is familiar with the talks between Turkey and Saudi Arabia, said, referring to Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler.
“He blames Erdogan personally for getting America involved, and for not closing the affair down within the first few days,” the source added.
A senior Turkish official with knowledge of the negotiations said earlier this year that Riyadh has become more serious about repairing ties with Ankara after Erdogan met Abu Dhabi’s Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed last November.
Turkey and the UAE repaired ties last year after nearly 10 years. The Turkish news agency Anadolu reported at the time that the two countries signed 13 agreements including on military, trade, climate change, industry, and the economy.
“We approached them in the past but they weren’t serious,” the official said. “This time they approached us. The Saudis felt like they have been getting excluded in this regional reconciliation. They would like to be a part of it.”
In addition to the Turkish case, there remains a second lawsuit in a U.S. federal court filed by Hatice Cengiz, Khashoggi’s fiancee, and the U.S.-based advocacy group Democracy for the Arab World Now (Dawn), which Khashoggi established and ran before his death.
This lawsuit, Turkish officials argue, is beyond their reach.