Government Saudi Arabia was in turmoil when Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) arrested King Salman’s brother or uncle, Prince Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz, on charges of treason.
The arrest took place in March 2020. Not only Prince Ahmed, King Salman’s nephew or MbS’s cousin, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, were arrested.
Since King Salman came to power, many senior Saudi princes have been removed to pave the way for MBS to the next throne, as quoted by Al Jazeera.
Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who was previously the Crown Prince, was forcibly removed by King Salman and replaced by MbS in June 2017. King Salman also removed Prince Mohammed bin Nayef from the post of Minister of Internal Affairs.
In the same year, MbS stepped up its consolidation action by ordering the security forces to arrest prominent princes and businessmen for anti-corruption reasons.
One of the victims of the arrest was Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a businessman and billionaire who owned a large share of Twitter at the time. Not only him, Prince Miteb as the son of the late King Abdullah was also removed from the post of head of the National Guard.
So far Prince MBS is said to have arrested more than 20 members of the royal family. More recently, Prince Abdullah bin Faisal Al Saud was also arrested and even sentenced to 30 years in prison.
According to a royal source, Prince Abdullah was caught discussing his cousin’s detention with relatives over the phone. At that time he was in the United States.
A media organization and Amnesty International also suspect that the Saudis are using Israeli-made military spyware Pegasus to spy on the royal family and Saudi citizens residing in other countries.
(blq / bac)
