POLITICIAN LE POLITICIEN December 2019
Saudi public prosecutor said that 11 defendants were presented to him alongside their lawyers at the first session and that the prosecution asked the death penalty for five for their role in the murder, and he accepted the prosecution’s demand.
sentenced to death may not deserve the ultimate penalty,” she added.
Khashoggi, still a Saudi citizen was visiting Turkey and needed some paperwork done to get married with his Turkish fiancée, Hatice Cengiz. On October 2, 2018, he entered Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul but never exited the building. Cengiz waited outside for him and, when he did not return, got in touch with authorities as he had instructed her to do, “if I don’t come out call the authorities including US embassy”. Authority’s action was late and he was gone forever.
“Today we have been granted justice as the children of the deceased, God willing, Jamal Khashoggi. We affirm our confidence in the Saudi judiciary at all levels, that it has been fair to us and that justice has been achieved,” he said in a Twitter post.
The slain journalist’s son, Salah Khashoggi, said his family had achieved justice, thanks to the verdict of Saudi Arabia’s public prosecutor.
Paris-based media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders said that justice was “trampled on” with the death sentences meted out after a trial that did not respect international standards of justice.
In the meantime another woman, last named Atr surfaced in US claiming to be his wife who he kept secret from his family and Turkish fiancée. She showed the wedding documents and photographs to the press. The wedding however, is not registered. Turkish Investigator Agnes Callamard and international rights groups have conThe verdict left Khashoggi’s fiancee Hat- demned the verdict. Earlier this year, Turkice Cengiz unsatisfied, with her saying on ish intelligence agencies concluded that Twitter that the “Saudi announcement not he was killed in a premeditated murder. acceptable”. Khashoggi’s friend and edi- Turkish officials believed that the body of tor at the Washington Post, Karen Attiah, Khashoggi, was cut up then rolled up in a said, “Justice for Jamal Khashoggi’s sense- rug and given to a “local cooperator” for less, horrific death is not more senseless disposal. deaths”. “More anonymous bloodshed is not closure. The ‘trials’ were in secret. For Initially, CIA has reportedly concluded that all we know, these five men who have been Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Sal-
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