Jamal Khashoggi: US lawmakers give 30 days deadline to US spy chief to name killers

In pursuit of seeking liability for the death of Saudi Arabia's dissent and Washington Post columnist, Jamal Khashoggi, the US lawmakers have urged the US intelligence agency chief to formally declare those behind his assassination. The CIA, however, in 2018 has already concluded that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman personally ordered Khashoggi's brutal killing. The charge has been firmly refuted by Riyadh.

The National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA), an annual US military spending bill was passed by the US House of Representatives last week and would go for approval to the Senate next week before turning it into law with US President Donald Trump's assent. In the discussions of the NDAA, US lawmakers demanded evidence in the death of Khashoggi. If the law is enacted, the head of the US Intelligence Community will have to provide a report to US Congress as to who orchestrated the assassination of Jamal Kashoggi, within 30 days. Jamal Khashoggi was brutally murdered, and then his body dismembered inside the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul in October 2018.

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According to international reports, Donald Trump's advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner led the negotiations on behalf of the White House. However, insisted on removing the punitive clauses against the Kingdom. In November 2019, a whistleblower had claimed that Kushner gave a green light to the Crown Prince to arrest his dissent, Khashoggi. According to international reports, Turkish intelligence intercepted the call between Kushner and the Crown. The information was later reportedly leveraged by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to drive Donald Trump out of northern Syria, and abandon US' Kurdish ally.

As per the Bill passed by the US House, the report will address, "role of any current or former official of the Government of Saudi Arabia or any current or former senior Saudi political figure over the directing, ordering, or tampering of evidence in the killing" of the Saudi Arabian journalist. The US intelligence officers would then corroborate those "responsible for, or "complicit in, ordering, controlling, or otherwise directing" the murder, along with that, those who impeded the impartial investigation" into the assassination later. 

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Khashoggi murder, Trump's reaction

Apart from the CIA, UN's human rights investigator Agnes Callamard, in a similar conclusion had said that the murder was a "deliberate, premeditated execution." She further called for a probe against the ally of the US, Mohammed bin Salman himself.  However, the US President had dismissed a UN request for the FBI to probe the murder, stating that it would jeopardise the US arms sale to the Kingdom. 

Questioned if he would allow the FBI to investigate, Trump said, "I think it’s been heavily investigated." Trump's sloppy approach in the murder, enabled the Saudi Kingdom to cover-up the murder and reintegrate the Mohammed bin Salman in the world community, despite the global outrage. Saudi Arabia is the top US weapon buyer. Amid tensions over the killing of Khashoggi, last year in October, Donald Trump said that he was not keen on putting an halt to the '$110 billion investment of Saudi Arabia into the US.'

Jamal Khashoggi was reportedly killed on the direct orders of Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, by a team of 15 Saudi officials, comprising of Mohammed bin Salman's own security official. On October 2, 2018, Khashoggi was tortured for 7 minutes, where he was suffocated and his body was dismembered with a bone saw. 

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