Sherif Mansour, Michael De Dora
Dozens of countries took Saudi Arabia to task at the United Nations Human Rights Council earlier this month for its human rights violations, demanding accountability for the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The rebuke came just days after U.S. President Donald Trump was revealed to have admitted on tape that he helped shield the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, from scrutiny by obstructing Congress’ inquiries into Khashoggi’s brutal murder at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, in October 2018. “I saved his ass,” Trump reportedly said of the crown prince in an interview with the journalist Bob Woodward.
Trump’s remarks were nothing less than an admission that he gave MBS, as the crown prince is widely known, a license to kill journalists with impunity. It fits with the broader message he’s sent to Saudi Arabia and other authoritarian countries in the wake of Khashoggi’s murder: Do business with us, and we’ll look the other way when you surveil, intimidate or murder critics of your government—even if they are U.S. residents. The Saudi government has responded, unsurprisingly, by intensifying its domestic crackdown on the press, arresting journalists and sentencing them to years in prison.
Now, as the second anniversary of Khashoggi’s murder approaches, U.S. policymakers and elected officials must take steps to send a different message: that the assassination of a journalist will never be tolerated.
The fight for transparency and justice for Khashoggi in the U.S. has been an uphill one, mainly due to the Trump administration’s intransigence. The administration has ignored numerous requests from Congress to investigate the murder, including a legally binding requirement that a bipartisan group of senators triggered in 2018 under the Global Magnitsky Act. That would have required Trump to investigate Khashoggi’s killing and provide a report to Congress, a deadline he ignored.
While the administration did announce sanctions on 17 Saudi officials implicated in the killing, the designations did not include high-ranking officials such as MBS, even though the U.S. intelligence community reportedly concluded that he ordered the assassination and the Senate unanimously found that he was responsible. Even when Congress sought to punish Riyadh by voting to end American support for the Saudi war in Yemen, or by blocking U.S. arms sales, Trump vetoed the measures. In one case, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo used a dubious declaration of an emergency to bypass Congress’ refusal to approve $8 billion in arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Given the Trump administration’s stonewalling, some advocates may be resigned to simply wait for a new administration. But that approach assumes and risks too much. Congress should continue to use the various tools at its disposal to keep pressure on the administration and the Saudi regime.
In one welcome development, the House Intelligence Committee recently approved a funding bill that includes a provision reaffirming the legal requirement that the U.S. intelligence community provide Congress with an unclassified report on Khashoggi’s murder. Until that happens, the measure would withhold funding for U.S. engagement with Saudi intelligence or security services. The bill is awaiting a vote in the House.
Given the possible role of Saudi intelligence services in Khashoggi’s murder, this provision would impose real costs on Riyadh. Our organization, the Committee to Protect Journalists, has documented how the Saudis likely spied on Khashoggi and his colleagues through the use of surveillance technology called Pegasus, made by the Israeli spyware company NSO Group, which is the target of a lawsuit in Israel. We also know the Saudis have used such tools to spy on numerous journalists and dissidents.
Trump has sent a clear message to Saudi Arabia: Do business with us, and we’ll look the other way when you surveil, intimidate or murder critics of your government.
Right now, it is far too easy for abusive regimes to use such tools to threaten journalists and dissidents. This is a problem that hits home in the U.S., as well. Facebook has accused the NSO Group of using U.S.-based servers to install spyware on mobile phones, and there have been reports of former U.S. intelligence agents working for foreign governments to help them surveil journalists and dissidents. Congress has a role to play here, by critically examining the proliferation of surveillance technology like Pegasus, and exploring U.S. and global policy responses.
But given the inaction by the Trump administration and the myriad issues that grip Washington policymakers—including the pending election in November and the COVID-19 pandemic—it may fall on U.S. courts to secure some progress in Khashoggi’s case.
CPJ is currently leading a federal lawsuit against the U.S. intelligence community, seeking the release of documents that may provide information on its awareness of threats to Khashoggi’s life. The CIA, one of the defendants in our case, reportedly warned several of Khashoggi’s associates about threats from Saudi Arabia. The agency denied our requests for documents under the Freedom of Information Act on possible threats or warnings to Khashoggi himself.
The intelligence community has argued that merely confirming or denying the existence of any such documents related to Khashoggi’s case is a threat to U.S. national security. In a ruling for the defendants, a federal judge in Washington recently accepted that argument, but we vehemently disagree and are in the process of appealing the verdict.
Our case, which enjoys broad support from civil society organizations, urges that the intelligence community be ordered to confirm or deny the existence of documents, or else submit more detailed explanations that adequately justify their withholding of them. The intelligence community’s response is due this Thursday. Similarly, a federal court in New York will consider a lawsuit by the Open Society Justice Initiative, filed under the Freedom of Information Act, seeking to compel the administration to immediately make public its assessment of who is responsible for Khashoggi’s murder.
The Trump administration’s lackluster response to Khashoggi’s killing is one example of how it has given oppressive regimes a green light to abuse the human rights of their citizens, leaving record numbers of journalists behind bars around the world. Just last month, Jordanian authorities arrested and charged cartoonist Emad Hajjaj for his criticism of the recent normalization agreement between Israel and the UAE. The State Department, which has routinely issued statements of concern on press freedom violations around the world, remained quiet on Hajjaj’s case.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia currently holds the rotating presidency of the G-20, and is due to convene a summit in November aimed at restoring MBS’ image as a reformer. The U.S. and other G-20 countries have an opportunity to use that occasion to pressure the Saudis again about Khashoggi, and on the fact that Saudi Arabia is one of the world’s worst jailers of journalists. Failure to do so will only encourage further abuses.
It will take years of work to undo the damage done by the Trump administration to America’s reputation on human rights and to journalists and dissidents around the world. But that work need not wait until the next election. Two years after the brazen murder of Jamal Khashoggi, it is still not too late to secure justice.
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