French police on Tuesday arrested a man that they believe to be a member of the hit squad that murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 at the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul, according to sources cited by the AFP news agency. But a Saudi official told Reuters that police had the wrong man, calling it a case of mistaken identity.
The man believed to have been arrested, 33-year-old Khalid Alotaibi, is wanted by Turkey to face justice over the killing. A French judicial source told Reuters that they are still in the process of verifying the arrested man’s identity.
The man was detained by border police on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by Turkey as he was about to board a flight to Riyadh from Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport, judicial and airport sources told AFP. He is due to appear before prosecutors on Wednesday.
Saudi Arabia’s embassy in France said the person who was arrested on Tuesday was not involved in the Khashoggi case and called for his immediate release, according to Reuters.
Alotaibi is one of 26 Saudis charged in absentia by Turkey over the killing in a trial that got underway in October 2020. If convicted, he could face life imprisonment.
Two of the 26 being tried in absentia in Turkey are former aides to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. No Saudi official has ever faced justice in person in Turkey for the killing.
Alotaibi is also one of 17 people that the U.S. Treasury designated for sanctions in 2018 over their alleged role in the murder.
If the arrested man is identified as Alotaibi, he will have the right to fight extradition to Turkey. If he does, the French judiciary must decide whether to keep him in detention pending a formal Turkish extradition request, or to free him on condition that he does not leave France.
It can typically take several weeks for a court to rule on whether to hand him over to Turkey against his will.
Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi who lived in self-exile in the United States and wrote for The Washington Post, entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018, to file paperwork to marry his Turkish fiancée.
According to U.S. and Turkish officials, a waiting Saudi hit squad strangled him and dismembered his body, which has never been found.
The gruesome murder sparked international outrage that continues to reverberate, with Western intelligence agencies accusing Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of authorizing the killing.
After a closed-door trial last year, a Saudi court sentenced eight people to jail in the case, but their identities were not released. Khashoggi’s fiancée called the ruling “a complete mockery of justice.”
Tuesday’s arrest of Alotaibi comes only days after French President Emmanuel Macron defended his decision to include Saudi Arabia in a tour of Gulf states, saying the visit did not mean that he had “forgotten” about the Khashoggi case.
After meeting with the Saudi crown prince, Macron said he had raised the question of human rights “without any taboo,” and said he hoped to see progress over the coming weeks and months.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the order to murder Khashoggi came from “the highest levels” of the Saudi government, and the case led to tensions between the two countries.
But Erdogan has never directly blamed Prince Mohammed, and there have been signs of the thaw between Turkey and Saudi Arabia in recent months, with the Turkish foreign minister visiting Riyadh earlier this year in a bid to mend ties.
There have also been signs of a thaw between Turkey and Saudi Arabia’s top ally, the United Arab Emirates, with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed visiting Turkey last month.
On the third anniversary of the killing, Khashoggi’s fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, who was waiting outside the consulate while the murder took place, accused the U.S. of failing to hold Saudi Arabia accountable.
Cengiz welcomed reports of Alotaibi’s arrest on Tuesday, tweeting that France “should try him for his crime, or extradite him to a country able and willing to genuinely investigate and prosecute him as well as the person who gave the order to murder Jamal.”
Download our Free App
For Breaking News & Analysis Download the Free CBS News app
