NEW YORK (Dispatches) – The UN has reiterated the need to hold accountable those accused of killing Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October, 2018.
French media quoted judicial sources in reports that police at the Roissy-Charles de Gaulle Airport north of Paris had arrested Khalid al-Otaibi, 33, on the basis of an international arrest warrant issued by Turkey. He was detained just before he was due to board a flight for Riyadh.
The Saudi man arrested in Paris in connection with the murder of Khashoggi has been released, AFP reported prosecutors saying on Wednesday.
“In-depth verifications to determine the identity of this person have enabled us to establish that the warrant was not applicable to him,” the chief prosecutor in Paris said in a statement.
Commenting on the issue, Stephane Dujarric, a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, said, “We are facing a judicial process that is taking place at the moment.”
Dujarric added during a press conference in New York that the secretary-general’s position has been clear from the beginning, which is his emphasis on the need “to implement the principle of accountability” in the Khashoggi murder. Al-Otaibi is suspected of being one of the 20-member Saudi hit squad that killed the Washington Post columnist.
Saudi Arabia initially issued conflicting stories about Khashoggi’s disappearance, but eventually claimed he had been killed in a “rogue” operation. But Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is widely believed, including by the CIA, to have personally ordered the murder.
In September 2020, a Saudi court sentenced “unnamed persons” found guilty of Khashoggi’s murder to prison terms ranging from seven to 20 years.
Bin Salman is also accused of ordering assassination missions against former Saudi intelligence official Saad al-Jabri who currently resides in Canada and revealed earlier this year that he had faced repeated threats on his life.
In June, Saudi Arabia was named by the Human Rights Measurement Initiative (HRMI) as the second-worst country in the world in terms of human rights due to its ban on protests, limits on free expression and civil society organizations, and the inability of citizens to vote or participate in public life.