‘US to announce decision of action regarding Khashoggi’s death’
Washington: US is weighing “different options” concerning the death of a Saudi journalist and will announce its decision of action, said the White House.
In a press briefing, White House spokesperson Sarah Sanders said that US President Donald Trump had met last week with CIA Director Gina Haspel “after having gathered additional intelligence on her overseas trip,” Xinhua news agency reported on Monday.
“The administration is weighing different options, and we’ll make an announcement about what the decision of that action is,” she said.
“The administration is considering what action we will take moving forward based on that information and the briefing that the President received last week,” she added, refusing to predict what the actual action would be and when that will happen.
Khashoggi, a columnist for The Washington Post, disappeared during a visit to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on October 2.
After two weeks of denial, Riyadh admitted that the journalist was killed during a physical fight with the people in the Saudi consulate, but did not give any explanation about the cause of his death.
In his first public comments since the journalist’s death, the Saudi crown prince promised on Wednesday that Khashoggi’s killers would be brought to justice.
So far, 18 Saudis have been arrested in connection with the incident.
Trump said earlier this month that he will impose severe punishment if Saudi Arabia is confirmed to be behind Khashoggi’s death.
However, he refused to list what measures he would take, only saying that he would not choose to impose sanctions on the country for fear of losing its military sales orders with US companies.