Secretary of State Tony Blinken refused to call Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman a killer on Sunday’s broadcast of “State of the Union” when asked about President Joe Biden calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a killer.
Anchor Dana Bash said, “The Biden administration did not directly punish Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi showing he was directly responsible for his murder. President Biden didn’t hesitate to call Vladimir Putin a killer. So you consider Mohammed bin Salman a killer?
Blinken said, “Here’s what’s important, the report you referred to, we put out in the full light of day. It was not a report written a couple of weeks ago. It had been sitting around for a little while. We put it out. That in and of itself is significant. It’s not that there was anything new in the report in terms of what had previously been reported, but the fact that the government of the United States puts its info mat on that information, including responsibility for the murder of Mr. Khashoggi on the ground I think is in and of itself important. Second, we sanctioned a number of direct participants in the murder of Mr. Khashoggi and maybe as significantly going forward, to make sure that to the best of our abilities, this doesn’t happen again. We put in place it’s called the Khashoggi ban, which makes sure that anyone who on behalf of the government tries to intimidate, silence or do harm to someone speaking out against that government, whether it’s a dissident, a political opponent, or a journalist, well, we will make sure that person does not set foot in the United States, and that applies not just to Saudi Arabia. It applies to around the world.”
Bash said, “Let me just get in and just say that you have been transparent and you have been very clear about his role, the Saudi crown prince’s role. So is he a killer?”
Blinken said, “Here’s the other fact that’s very important. We have to when we do deal every day around the world with leaders of countries who do things we find either from objectionable to abhorrent, but in terms of actually advancing our interests and advancing our values, it’s important to deal with them. The crown prince is likely to be the leader of Saudi Arabia far into the future. We have a strong interest, for example, in working to end the war in Yemen, probably the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. That will take meaningful engagement by the Saudis. Doing so, we have actually made real progress in that direction in the last couple of months. Doing so is going to advance values that we hold dear in terms of protecting the lives of innocent civilians.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN
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