DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Saudi Arabia’s most level-headed army commander in its years-long war in Yemen and his prince-son have been ignored along with other officials as part of an anti-corruption investigation, the kingdom announced Tuesday.
The announcement attributed the movements to a referral to Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, the 35-year-old son of King Salman who in the past had made mass arrests as a component of a similar anti-corruption crusade that also targeted potential rivals in his country. Rule.
An article by the Saudi state news firm referred to “suspicious monetary transactions monitored in the Ministry of Defence”, without giving additional details.
As a result, he said the kingdom had fired Lieutenant General Fahad bin Turki bin Abdulaziz, a prince of Saudi Arabia’s ruling family circle in the index of Allied forces in the Saudi War in Yemen opposed to Iran’s Allied Houthi rebels.
The government also got rid of his son, Prince Abdulaziz bin Fahad bin Turki, from his post as deputy governor of Saudi Arabia’s al-Jouf region in the northwest of the kingdom.
The kingdom is also investigating four other officials, all on the orders of 84-year-old King Salman, according to the statement, and not without transparent delay if the defendants had been arrested or if they had lawyers.
Anti-corruption officials “must complete the investigation procedures with all applicable military and civilian officers, take the mandatory legal measures that oppose them, and present the results,” he said.
Lieutenant General Fahad did not resume the war in Yemen until February 2018, years in the stagnation of the crusade that still sees the Houthis stopping the capital, Sanaa. In the past he served as a paratrooper and special forces commander, as well as overseeing the Royal Land Forces of Saudi Arabia.
He took over the coalition from a major restructuring of the Saudi army at the time.
The war in Yemen, which has killed more than 100,000 people, displaced millions of people and destroyed the poorest country in the Arab world, has the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. It started with the Houthi rebels who took Sanaa in September 2014 and then marched south. Saudi Arabia and the allied countries entered the clash in March 2015, led by then-Prince Mohammed as Saudi Defense Minister.
The war has a regional conflict, as the Iranian-backed Houthis control the north and a variety of forces operate in the south under the aegis of the Saudi-led coalition.
Saudi airstrikes killing civilians and torture of prisoners in UAE-controlled prisons have condemned the foreign coalition. The Houthis are outraged by the theft of humanitarian aid, the indiscriminate use of landmines and the sending of children into conflict.
The Saudi-led coalition broke out as the war continued, especially after the withdrawal of Emirati troops last year. UAE-backed separatists have brazenly fought Yemen’s identified government around the world, which has been founded in Saudi Arabia for years. has exploded in recent days.
After taking office, Crown Prince Mohammed conducted several anti-corruption campaigns, adding the transformation of Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton hotel into a luxury criminal in 2017 as a component of a mass arrest of businessmen, members of the royal circle of family members and others. The other liberated people agreed to dispose of some of their assets, giving the repression an impression of repression.