Saudi FM to meet with Pompeo for inaugural strategic dialogue

Oct 13, 2020

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will meet with his Saudi counterpart, Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, in Washington on Wednesday for the inaugural US-Saudi strategic dialogue, the State Department said

“The dialogue will focus on our shared commitments to the furthering of regional security and prosperity, economic development,” said a US State Department statement today.

The statement also referenced “the people-to-people exchanges that have underpinned our bilateral relationship since the seminal meeting between President Roosevelt and King Abdulaziz aboard the USS Quincy 75 years ago.” 

Before his appointment as foreign minister last year, Faisal served as ambassador to Germany and political adviser at the Saudi Embassy in Washington. Both he and Pompeo are expected to deliver remarks to the press Wednesday morning. 

The US relationship with Saudi Arabia garnered new scrutiny following the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi two years ago this month in Turkey. The CIA concluded with “medium to high” confidence that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman personally ordered the Virginia resident’s killing inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. 

But bipartisan efforts to hold Riyadh accountable for Khashoggi’s death have been met with resistance from the White House. President Donald Trump has been dismissive of the US intelligence and suggested that doing business with oil-rich Saudi Arabia outweighs concerns over Khashoggi’s murder. 

Trump, who views Saudi Arabia as a bulwark against Iran, has also been reluctant to end US military support for the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis in Yemen. Last year, he vetoed congressional resolutions that would have halted billions in weapons sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Pompeo is likely to raise Saudi Arabia’s relationship with Israel during his meeting with the foreign minister. Trump has said he expects Saudi Arabia to follow in the footsteps of the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain and soon normalize relations with the Jewish state. 

In a positive development, the Saudi government announced in September that it would permit flights “from all countries” to use its airspace when flying to or from the UAE. Saudi Arabia had long banned Israeli flights from crossing its airspace. 

Another issue expected to come up during the strategic dialogue is the more than three-year-long economic and diplomatic blockade that Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt have imposed on Qatar, which is home to the region’s largest US military base. During the third annual strategic dialogue with Qatari officials in Washington last month, Pompeo called for the Gulf countries to resolve their rift and end the blockade.