Alwaght- Five Republican senators on Wednesday sent a letter to the American President Donald Trump calling for him to end the ongoing talks with Saudi Arabia for cooperation in the nuclear energy sector as the outcry against Riyadh over the killing of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul continues.
The senators, the Washington Post reported, also threatened in the letter that they will file a legislation to block any civil nuclear agreements with the Arab monarchy if the president declines to suspend negotiations “for the foreseeable future.”
“We already held serious reservations about negotiations for such an agreement,” Marco Rubio, Republican of California, Todd C. Young, Republican of Indiana, Cory Gardner, Republican of Colorado, Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, and Dean Heller, Republican of Nevada, wrote in the letter, the US daily reported.
It was not only Khashoggi case that motivated the senators to move against Saudi Arabia. Its apparent intervention in the region, including the devastating war on Yemen and meddling in Lebanon’s home affairs were other reasons for the lawmakers to seek to boycott nuclear cooperation talks with the Saudis.
“The ongoing revelations about the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, as well as certain Saudi actions related to Yemen and Lebanon, have raised further serious concerns about the transparency, accountability, and judgment of current decision-makers in Saudi Arabia,” the letter read.
The US senators hardened their stances on the oil-wealthy kingdom following the assassination of the prominent Saudi writer Khashoggi. After three weeks of silence about his disappearance, the Saudi public prosecutor Saud al-Mojeb finally stated that the vocal critic of the crown prince was killed “accidentally” at the Saudi consulate after a “brawl” broke out upon his arrival, a story the world never believed.
The Senate’s top foreign policy lawmakers asked President Trump on October 10 to impose sanctions against anyone found responsible for the disappearance of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, even if that includes the leaders of Saudi Arabia. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, and the panel’s ranking Democrat, Sen. Robert Menendez, of New Jersey, triggered the Global Magnitsky Act, which is designed to sanction foreign governments and individuals, to be used in Saudi case.
The Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on October 21, however, said that it was premature to talk about sanctions on the kingdom for the death of Washington Post contributing columnist.
