Immunity for Mohammed Bin Salman is a Grave Mistake
By Joel D. Joseph, author of Injustice Department: An Elected Attorney General and an Independent Department of Justice
The Justice Department's defense of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, who is accused of murdering and dismembering Washington Post reporter Jamal Khashoggi, was not necessary legally and is an invitation to world leaders to flaunt human rights. It also gives Vladimir Putin a claim for immunity for his war crimes in the Ukraine.
Jamal Khashoggi's fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, and a non-profit organization DAWN, Democracy for the Arab World Now, sued the crown prince, his top aides and others in Washington D.C. federal court over their alleged roles in Khashoggi's killing. The lawsuit was filed under the Torture Victim Protection Act and the Alien Tort Statute, which give U.S. federal courts jurisdiction over crimes committed overseas. In addition, the lawsuit claims that the Saudis lured Mr. Khashoggi to his death in Istanbul by refusing to provide him with documents in the Saudi embassy in Washington, D.C. Khashoggi was killed and dismembered in October, 2018 by Saudi agents in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, an operation which U.S. intelligence believed was ordered by Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. "Jamal died again today," Khashoggi's ex-fiance'e, Hatice Cengiz, said minutes after the news became public that the Biden Administration supported Prince Salman's claim of immunity. She added later: "We thought maybe there would be a light to justice from the USA But again, money came first."A federal judge in Washington had given the U.S. government until midnight November 17th to express an opinion on the claim by the crown prince's lawyers that Prince Mohammed's high official standing renders him legally immune in the case. The Biden administration also had the option of not stating an opinion either way. However, the Biden administration's Justice Department sent the court a letter finding that Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has immunity from a lawsuit concerning the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
"It's beyond ironic that President Biden has singlehandedly assured MBS can escape accountability when it was President Biden who promised the American people he would do everything to hold him accountable," Whitson, said in a statement.
Saudi Arabia has sided with Russia in the Ukraine War by holding back oil production. Nineteen Saudis also participated in the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York and the crash of an American Airlines flight 77 into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Saudi Arabia is a feudal state, a dictatorship of one family depriving its citizens of civil rights. The Biden Administration should be ashamed of itself for protecting Saudi Arabia and Mohammed Bin Salman, the brutal murderer of Jamal Khashoggi.