RIYADH (Dispatches) – Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz has dismissed the country’s director of public security and referred him for investigation, the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said.
SPA said the dismissal of Khalid bin Qaraar al-Harbi comes as part of a royal decree that includes 19 other officials which it did not identify.
The decree was issued based on official reports that al-Harbi “committed numerous violations and breaches with the aim of seizing public money and personal interest.”
Al-Harbi stands “accused of committing a number of crimes, including forgery, bribery, and abuse of power, with the participation of 18 people from the public and private sectors.”
The order also directed the kingdom’s official Oversight and Anti-Corruption Authority, known as “Nazaha”, to complete investigations into him and everyone involved in the matter, without giving further details.
Nazaha will complete the investigation procedures and take necessary legal measures against all those involved in the graft case, the report said.
Harbi was appointed as the director of Saudi Arabia’s General Directorate of Public Security in December 2018.
Last month, Saudi Arabia announced the arrest of 207 employees across about a dozen government ministries on allegations of corruption, abuse of authority and fraud.
Nazaha announced the arrests on August 9. Those detained were not named and it was unclear when the arrests were made.
In April, Saudi Arabia announced that 176 people from across the country’s public sector had been detained on corruption charges.
Mohammed bin Salman, who became the Saudi crown prince in June 2017, has taken extreme measures to secure his power and to sideline all his potential political rivals within and outside the royal family.
The series of purges began in November 2017, five months after bin Salman assumed power, targeting more than 300 Saudi princes, public figures and businessmen.