UK academic calls for Saudi sanctions in Khashoggi case

By Ahmet Gurhan Kartal

LONDON

The international community should introduce diplomatic sanctions against Saudi Arabia over the alleged murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, said a prominent UK-based academic and political commentator on Friday.

Dr. Daud Abdullah, who is also the director of the Middle East Monitor in London, said: "There is an issue of criminal accountability for those who ordered it [the alleged murder of Khashoggi] and for those who executed it."

The Washington Post journalist has disappeared on Oct. 2 after entering the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. He has since been feared dead.

Speaking to Sky News channel, Abdullah drew parallels between the alleged murder in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul and the nerve-agent attack in Salisbury, U.K.

"There is also a need for diplomatic sanctions the type of which we saw being imposed upon Russia in the Salisbury affair," Abdullah said.

"It cannot be accepted that we did this in terms of Russia after the poisoning in Salisbury, the violation of British sovereign rights," he said.

The Salisbury nerve-agent attack targeted former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia Skripal earlier this year.

Abdullah said he last saw Khashoggi in a conference in September in London, adding the journalist's self-imposed exile proved his fear of the Saudi authorities as he was an open critic of the Saudi government.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday said, "Unless the miracle of all miracles happens, I would acknowledge that he’s dead."