Khashoggi killing: UN rapporteur Callamard to present report

Agnes Callamard, the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, is set to present her report on the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Callamard’s presentation before the UN Human Rights Council in the Swiss city of Geneva is set to start at 13:00 GMT on Wednesday, and will be followed by a news conference.

In her 100-page report, which was made public on June 19, Callamard says that Khashoggi’s killing at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October last year constituted a premeditated extrajudicial killing for which Saudi Arabia’s leadership was responsible.

The report also concluded that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also known as MBS, should be investigated regarding the incident.

Saudi Arabia carries UN Human Rights Council membership, and its representatives may be in the room while Callamard presents her findings. 

The killing of Khashoggi by a team of Saudi operatives inside the consulate on October 2 provoked outrage and marred the image of MBS. Khashoggi’s body has never been found.

Callamard says in her report that Saudi Arabia violated the Vienna Convention on consular relations, the UN charter on the prohibition of the use of force in times of peace as well as the principle of the right to life.

The targeted killings of journalists, dissenters and human rights defenders, more generally, are on the increase, warned Callamard in her recent remarks, adding that the most worrying pattern is the impunity that surrounds those actions.

Hatice Cengiz, the fiancée of Khashoggi, has called for for an international investigation into the killing.

“Not only high-level officials are involved in the killing, but the report says Saudi Arabia has tried to eliminate the evidence of it. It’s scandalous,” Cengiz said earlier this week.

Changing Saudi narrative

Khashoggi was a contributing columnist for the Washington Post and a US resident.

He was killed at the consulate when he arrived to pick up documents he needed for his planned marriage.

The 59-year-old Saudi insider-turned-critic was strangled and his body cut into pieces by a team of 15 Saudis sent to Istanbul for the killing, according to Turkish officials.

Turkish media reports suggested his remains, which have never been found, were dissolved in acid, while sources of Al Jazeera said there was circumstantial evidence suggesting Khashoggi’s remains were incinerated in the garden of the consular general’s residence, 300 metres from the consulate.

Riyadh officials say they do not know where Khashoggi’s remains are and blame his death on “rogue” agents.

Saudi Arabia’s narrative of what happened changed over time.

Riyadh first maintained Khashoggi left the consulate shortly after entering, but as Turkish authorities continued to leak evidence of high-level involvement, the country eventually admitted its agents carried out the killing with a series of contradictory explanations.

Saudi Arabia now says Khashoggi was killed in their consulate after a fight broke out with the people he met there, a claim that was debunked by Callamard’s report, in which the Saudi agents were cited discussing the journalist’s murder and dismemberment before he arrived at the consulate. 

Eighteen Saudi nationals were arrested over the issue, but the international community is sceptical about their trial going on in Riyadh.

In November the CIA concluded that MBS ordered Khashoggi’s assassination, according to US media reports. The finding contradicts Saudi government assertions that MBS was not involved. US officials expressed high confidence in the CIA assessment.

Read More



from Trend News Web https://ift.tt/2xdCS8r

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Allred: Tape appears to show R. Kelly sexually abusing girls

A man who said he was cleaning out an old videotape collection found what he thought was a recording of R&B singer R. Kelly in concert, but instead turned out to show a man who appeared to be Kelly sexually abusing girls, he and his attorney said Sunday. The man then turned the tape over to law enforcement, according to attorney Gloria Allred. She and her client, Gary Dennis, would not discuss the specifics of the tape during a news conference in New York. But Allred said it appears to show a separate incident from the 10 counts of aggravated sexual abuse that Kelly faces in Chicago, though she acknowledged she could not be “100 percent certain” that the man in the tape is Kelly. Steve Greenberg, an attorney for Kelly, noted that lack of certainty. “The doubt here is self-evident, with reporting that the man on the tape kinda, sorta looks like R. Kelly,” Greenberg said Sunday in an email. “That doesn’t make it him. It is not him.” The lawyer also said Kelly “denies that he is
Read more

Ranking Every No. 1 NBA Draft Pick from the Last 30 Years

Image
Gary Dineen/Getty Images 15. Larry Johnson, Charlotte Hornets, 1991 Johnson, an athletic marvel, came into the league with incalculable potential. He was Rookie of the Year in 1992, made the All-Star team in his second season and signed a 12-year, $84 million contract in 1993 that was the   largest   in league history at the time. Back problems sapped his bounce, but Johnson developed skills to compensate. The power forward shot 38.6 percent from deep and averaged 18.8 points, 7.2 rebounds and 4.6 assists in 1994-95 while making his second All-Star team. He was just as good the next year, posting averages of 20.5 points, 8.4 rebounds and 4.4 assists. Though decline set in following his move to the Knicks in 1996, Johnson was an effective player for the balance of his 10-year career. He ranks   10th   among No. 1 picks in the last 30 years with 69.7 win shares.          14. John Wall , Washington Wizards, 2010 Wall’s average of 9.2 assists is tops on our list, and his 1.7 ste
Read more

Attacks and bodyguards: The price of being a Colombian journalist

Image
Caucasia, Colombia – Leiderman Ortiz’s mother, sister, brother and nephew were visiting him in Caucasia in May 2010 when a loud blast went off outside the house where they were asleep. “I jumped out of my bed and started shouting, ‘Stay down, don’t move’,” Ortiz said. “My poor mother was screaming. She was terrified.” Unlike many others who have been targeted by the regular grenade attacks in Caucasia, a small city about 670km north of the Colombian capital Bogota, Ortiz isn’t a criminal. He writes about them. And the 2010 attack was the third of at least five known attempts or suspected attempts on the 45-year-old’s life. The first occurred in 2009 in Medellin when he was leaving an office and an armed individual was waiting for him. Ortiz saw the individual and called the police. The next year, the 2010 grenade attack occurred. Two days after that attack, another grenade was thrown into his garden. The following year, at least two suspected hitmen were paid to follow Ortiz, but
Read more