Senate Appropriations Committee hearing in Washington.
Washington After years of rising tensions on themes like Iran, regional security, and oil price, U.S.
On Tuseday Secretary of State Antony Blinken will go there In an attempt to repair ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia
In what would be Washington’s second recent high level visit to Saudi Arabia Blinken is scheduled to meet with top Saudi officials and perhaps the country’s de facto boss Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman widely known as MbS. On May 7, White House national security director Jake Sullivan visited Saudi Arabia.
The top American official will fly to the greatest oil producer in the world from June 6 to 8, only days after Riyadh revealed plans to seriously limit oil output. It is expected that between the US and Saudi Arabia this action could worsen already existing tensions. For More Information….
Due to the kingdom’s poor human rights record and differences over American foreign policy toward Iran.
The trip’s goals include raising prospects for a future repair of Saudi-Israeli relations, gaining power with Riyadh over oil price, and fighting Chinese and Russian influence in the area.
Blinken stated that Washington had a real national security interest in pushing the repair of formal ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia but warned that it would take time in a speech to the pro Israel lobby group the American Israel Public Affairs Committee on Monday.
The major goal of Blinken’s visit, according to senior adviser Richard Goldberg of the Washington based Foundation for Defense of Democracies FDD is to discourage the formation of bigger links between Saudi Arabia and China.
According to Goldberg, “Blinken should clarify why closer ties with Washington impede closer ties with China and why Chinese interests do not coincide with Saudi Arabia.”
TRIP BAN
U.S.-As soon as President Joe Biden announced during his campaign that if elected, he would treat Riyadh like “the pariah that they are” and as soon as he took office in 2021, he released a U.S. intelligence assessment claiming that Crown Prince Mohammed had authorized the operation to kidnap or kill journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Relationships between the United States and Saudi Arabia experienced tension as a result.
Riyadh has tried to reclaim its regional authority while growing less interested in being associated with U.S. interests in the area as a result of Biden’s visit to the kingdom in July 2022, which did little to ease tensions.
The most recent incident was when MbS gave Syrian President Bashar al-Assad a warm hug at an Arab League meeting in May, which saw Arab states readmit Syria after a decade-long ban, a move Washington claimed it neither approved nor pushed.
The government is spending billions of dollars in the development of its economy and trying to low the usage of crude oil.
Many MbS opponents, companies, clerics, and rights advocates have been jailed in connection with the changes.
In a message to Blinken on Tuesday, American citizens and residents who have relatives who are held in Saudi Arabia asked that he put pressure on Saudi officials to achieve the quick freedom of their loved ones. popular speaker Salman al-Odah, the child of former spy chief Saad al-Jabri, human rights hero Mohammed al-Qahtani, and relief worker Abdulrahman al-Sadhan were all put on the list.
Although the government had freed its inmates who were American citizens, some were still subject to a travel ban.
while talking about the trip to the US last week.
officials said there was a “ongoing conversation regarding the promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms” with Saudi Arabia, but they did not say if Blinken would seek for any promises on the problem.
