SUSPECTED MEMBER OF JAMAL KHASHOGGI HIT SQUAD ARRESTED AT PARIS AIRPORT: REPORT

Tue 07 December 2021:

At Charles de Gaulle Airport, a key suspect in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi was detained.

Khalid Alotaibi was captured at the airport as he prepared to fly to Saudi Arabia, according to reports. Alotaibi was detained in 2018 on allegations of murdering a Saudi Arabian journalist.

Khashoggi was a journalist of Saudi Arabian descent who was assassinated as soon as he entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey.

Later, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman claimed that Khashoggi’s assassination was carried out by a gang of state agents who had gone rogue. He also promised that these killings would be investigated and that justice would be served in the journalist’s death.

According to US and Turkish officials, a waiting Saudi hit squad strangled Khashoggi and dismembered his body, which has never been recovered.

The gruesome murder sparked international outrage that continues to reverberate, with Western intelligence agencies accusing the Saudi crown prince of authorising the killing.

A Turkish court in 2020 began to try in absentia 20 suspects over the murder of Khashoggi, including two former aides to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Khaled Aedh Al-Otaibi 33, was identified as a member of the “commando” group at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, where Khashoggi was murdered on October 2, 2018. After Turkey issued an arrest warrant, he was placed on the Interpol red list. According to French radio station RTL, who broke the story, he was traveling under his true identity.

Khashoggi was a notable journalist based in self-exile in the United States who worked for the Washington Post. A assassination squad strangled the journalist in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, and his body was dismembered later.

Since 2018, authorities have been on the lookout for his killers.

The arrest came just days after French President Emmanuel Macron visited the United Arab Emirates and met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is accused of ordering the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, a former Middle East Eye and Washington Post columnist and outspoken critic of the Saudi regime.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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