Saudi Arabia finally congratulates Biden on his win

[webfact]

Saudi Arabia finally congratulates Biden on his win

By Marwa Rashad

 

FILE PHOTO: Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman attends the Gulf Cooperation Council's (GCC) 40th Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia December 10, 2019. Bandar Algaloud/Courtesy of Saudi Royal Court/Handout via REUTERS

 

RIYADH (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia finally congratulated Joe Biden on Sunday over his election victory, more than 24 hours after he defeated Donald Trump, who had close personal ties with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

 

The former U.S. vice president pledged in his campaign to reassess ties with the kingdom, demanding more accountability over the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Riyadh's Istanbul consulate and calling for an end to U.S. support for the Yemen war.

 

As other Arab states raced to applaud the Democrat challenger, the kingdom's de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman remained silent on the U.S. vote even as he sent warm words to the president of Tanzania on his re-election.

 

At 1932 GMT on Sunday, Saudi Arabia's king Salman and his son, the crown prince, congratulated Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on winning the presidential election, state news agency SPA reported.

 

"King Salman praised the distinguished, historic and close relations between the two friendly countries and their people which everyone looks to strengthen and develop at all levels," SPA added.

 

Prince Mohammed's relationship with Trump had provided a buffer against international criticism over Riyadh's rights record sparked by Khashoggi's murder, Riyadh's role in Yemen's war and the detention of women activists.

 

Those areas may now become points of friction between Biden and Saudi Arabia, a major oil exporter and buyer of U.S. arms.

 

"The only thing worse than COVID-19 would be BIDEN-20," wrote Saudi Twitter user Dr Muna, while many other Saudi users of the social media platform simply ignored the result in the initial hours after U.S. networks called the election for Biden.

 

A Saudi political source played down the risk of a falling out between the kingdom and the United States, pointing to Riyadh's historic ties with Washington.

 

But Saudi Arabia's Okaz newspaper offered a sense of the uncertainty about how the future plays out for the kingdom. "The region is waiting ... and preparing ... for what happens after Biden’s victory," it wrote in a front page article.

 

The kingdom may not have to wait long. Neil Quilliam, associate fellow at Britain's Chatham House think-tank, said the Biden administration would likely seek to signal early on its discontent with Saudi domestic and foreign policies.

 

"The Saudi leadership is concerned that a Biden administration and a hostile Congress will carry out a full review of relations, including re-evaluating defence ties and therefore will likely make positive sounds and moves towards ending the Yemen conflict," he said.

 

Saudi Arabia was an enthusiastic backer of Trump's "maximum pressure" of tough sanctions on regional rival Iran. But Biden has said he would return to a 2015 nuclear pact between world powers and Tehran, a deal negotiated when Biden was vice president in Barack Obama's administration.

 

Abu Zaid, a cashier at a supermarket in Riyadh, said he hoped Biden would take a different approach. "I am not happy with the Biden win, but I hope he learns from Obama's mistakes and realises that Iran is a common enemy," he said.

 

A Saudi political source said the kingdom had "the ability to deal with any president because the U.S. is a country of institutions and there is a lot of institutional work between Saudi Arabia and the United States."

 

"Saudi-U.S. relations are deep, sustainable, and strategic and not prone to change because a president changes," he said.

 

Prince Mohammed had denied ordering Khashoggi’s killing but in 2019 he acknowledged some personal accountability by saying that it happened on his watch. Riyadh has jailed eight people for between seven and 20 years in the case.

 

(Additional reporting by Aziz El Yaakoubi in Dubai; Writing by Michael Georgy; Editing by Edmund Blair and Philippa Fletcher)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-11-09

 

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Let's hope a Biden victory leads to a reevaluation of support for the MbS's nuclear power program. Given his track record, is there anyone out there foolish who thinks it's a good to give MbS the potential means to create nuclear weapons? I mean apart from Trump and company.

[Fat is a type of crazy]

Dictators are dictators. Call them King, or Dear Leader of North Korea, or President of Russia. Putin is still quiet about the result. This is a shot in the arm for democracy around the world.

[TopDeadSenter]

Saudi is right to be pleased. They may as well party now. A Biden admin that cracks down on fracking and fossil fuel exploration and drilling could easily make the US dependant on foreign fossil fuels again. Being dependant on the likes of Saudi, Russia and Opec was not a good thing for the US, and one of Trumps many achievements was making the US energy self sufficient and self reliant. I suppose high oil prices might please Biden's wall street backers, so some good can come of it.

[Lacessit]

The Saudis will adjust to the new reality, without American support the Iranians would be all over them like a cheap suit.

[Lacessit]

Just now, TopDeadSenter said:

Saudi is right to be pleased. They may as well party now. A Biden admin that cracks down on fracking and fossil fuel exploration and drilling could easily make the US dependant on foreign fossil fuels again. Being dependant on the likes of Saudi, Russia and Opec was not a good thing for the US, and one of Trumps many achievements was making the US energy self sufficient and self reliant. I suppose high oil prices might please Biden's wall street backers, so some good can come of it.

LOL, you do post some dreadful tosh.

US energy is not self sufficient, it's a Red Queen's race. Depletion rates on Saudi conventional oil fields range from 30 to 50 years, with shale oil extraction 12 months with luck. Oil companies in America have to be drilling holes non-stop to match depletion, the result is every oil producer in the USA is drowning in debt.

Perhaps, in your devotion to Trump's policy vacuum, you haven't read any of Biden's platform. A commitment to renewable energy, reduced dependence on fossil fuels.

Or perhaps you forgot the oil price war between Russia and the Saudis early this year, resulting in the oil price going negative for a short time.

 

[mr mr]

ahhhh yes saudi. where human rights and beheading's go hand in head. 

[Tug]

26 minutes ago, mr mr said:

ahhhh yes saudi. where human rights and beheading's go hand in head. 

That’s if they dident lop off your hand first (with or without a bone saw)

[pegman]

On 11/8/2020 at 5:22 PM, TopDeadSenter said:

Saudi is right to be pleased. They may as well party now. A Biden admin that cracks down on fracking and fossil fuel exploration and drilling could easily make the US dependant on foreign fossil fuels again. Being dependant on the likes of Saudi, Russia and Opec was not a good thing for the US, and one of Trumps many achievements was making the US energy self sufficient and self reliant. I suppose high oil prices might please Biden's wall street backers, so some good can come of it.

56% of USA imported crude is from Canada. Saudi share is 6%.