WASHINGTON (Middle East Eye) – U.S. Congressman Gerry Connolly has urged fellow lawmakers to approve an amendment to the annual military spending bill, stating it was the only way to guarantee ‘justice’ over the 2018 murder of dissident columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
Speaking at an event on Thursday - just a few days shy of the third anniversary of Khashoggi’s killing - Connolly said the text, which was added to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) earlier this year, was crucial to holding the kingdom accountable over the murder.
“We are not going to allow the memory of Jamal Khashoggi to fade, and we’re going to insist on justice,” Connolly said at an event hosted by Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), an organization Khashoggi founded.
Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018 after he entered the premises to obtain paperwork for his planned marriage to his Turkish fiancée, Hatice Cengiz. His remains are yet to be found.
Saudi authorities had initially insisted Khashoggi left the building alive, taking two weeks to acknowledge the journalist had been killed. Still, Riyadh claims the assassination was a rogue operation that happened without the approval of top officials.
Shortly after U.S. President Joe Biden was sworn into office, the director of national intelligence released a report that concluded Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) had approved the murder.
“We have always known, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman directed the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi,” he said.
“We also know that this operation is part of a broad and ongoing effort to use violence to intimidate and silence dissidents abroad.
“Furthermore, we know that some of the killers were trained here in the United States, demonstrating an overwhelming need for changes to our current arms sales processes, increased accountability and reforms in who and how we train foreign nationals in other militaries here in the United States.”
Connolly sponsored a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives earlier this year which sets limits on arms sales to Riyadh and calls for bans on Saudi intelligence and law enforcement bodies which detain American citizens and residents in the kingdom or prevent them and their families from travelling.
In his remarks on Thursday, Connolly said Riyadh had been repeatedly “shielded from responsibility” by former president Donald Trump’s administration.
Biden’s decision to publish the CIA report on the murder, after bipartisan calls to do so, had raised hopes among rights groups the new administration would hold MBS to account. But the administration decided against imposing sanctions on the crown prince to avoid a ‘rupture’ in U.S.-Saudi ties.