Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and other senior officials should be investigated over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi given credible evidence against them, a U.N. rights investigator said on Wednesday.
Khashoggi’s death stirred widespread disgust and hurt the image of the prince, previously admired in the West for pushing to end the kingdom’s oil dependence and easing social restrictions including by allowing women to drive.
After a six-month investigation, the 100-page report by the U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, Agnes Callamard, accused Saudi Arabia of a “deliberate, premeditated execution”.
“There is sufficient credible evidence regarding the responsibility of the crown prince demanding further investigation,” Callamard said.
In Riyadh, a minister rejected the report as having nothing new and containing “baseless allegations.”
After the killing, some Western executives pulled out of an investment forum in Riyadh. But big investors have pushed ahead with deals this year in a sign that an effort by the kingdom to return to business as usual is making headway.
Callamard urged nations to cut export licenses for surveillance technologies until Saudi Arabia shows it is limiting their use to “lawful purposes.”
She also called on the United States to open an FBI investigation and pursue criminal prosecutions within the United States. The FBI declined to comment.
Callamard also urged states to widen sanctions to include the crown prince and his assets abroad, unless the man seen by many as the de facto Saudi ruler can prove no responsibility.
“The people directly implicated in the murder reported to him, so there is a reporting line there that needs to be further investigated,” she told reporters.
Khashoggi, a critic of the prince and a Washington Post columnist, was last seen at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2 where he was to receive papers ahead of his wedding.
His body was dismembered and removed from the building, the Saudi prosecutor has said, and his remains have not been found.