Mohamed Ben Salmane, the Saudi Crown Prince known as MBS, will begin a tour of Egypt, Jordan, and Turkey on Monday, June 20, before visiting other countries including Algeria at the end of July.
A Saudi official, who requested anonymity, told Agence France Presse (AFP) that MBS is expected in Greece, Cyprus and Algeria “towards the end of July”. The Saudi government has not confirmed this tour of the crown prince. Mohamed Ben Salmane, the Saudi Crown Prince was known as MBS, will begin a tour of Egypt, Jordan, and Turkey on Monday, June 20, before visiting other countries including Algeria at the end of July.
A Saudi official, who requested anonymity, told Agence France Presse (AFP) that MBS is expected in Greece, Cyprus and Algeria “towards the end of July”. The Saudi government has not confirmed this tour of the crown prince.
Algeria is preparing to host the Arab League summit on November 1 and Saudi Arabia’s support is essential for its success at a time when the Arab world is sharply divided with, in particular, the breakdown of relations between Algiers and Rabat, the situation in Libya and the war in Yemen.
On May 19, during a visit to Algiers, the Saudi Minister of Foreign Affairs, Prince Fayçal Ben Farhan Ben Abdallah Al Saud described relations between Algeria and Saudi Arabia as an “essential milestone” in joint Arab action.
He thanked Algeria for its support for his country’s candidacy to host the Expo 2030 universal exhibition in Riyadh and in turn expressed Saudi Arabia’s support for “Algeria’s aspiration to a seat to the Security Council,” according to the report by the official APS agency.
Algeria has regularly denounced in recent months the attacks of the Haouthi rebels against Saudi Arabia which is entangled with an Arab coalition in the war in Yemen.
Rehabilitation
In December 2018, amid the global crisis sparked by the death of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered inside the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, MBS paid a two-day visit to Algeria. This visit had caused controversy. Political parties like the MSP have criticized the power, accusing it of having received the Saudi crown prince.
Since then, the Saudi crown prince has become popular and many foreign heads of state have visited Riyadh. Last April, Turkish President Recep Tayyib Erdogan visited Saudi Arabia where he met with MBS, ending the crisis between the two countries that erupted after Khashoggi’s assassination.
US President Joe Biden, who considered Saudi Arabia a pariah country before his election last December, will travel to Riyadh in mid-July to seal the rehabilitation of MBS internationally.
The latter was accused in a declassified CIA report in February 2021 of having validated the assassination of Khashoggi. Saudi Arabia denied these charges.
