MBS embarked on his own mini-tour of the region on Monday, with its first leg taking him to Egypt, Saudi media and Western news agencies have reported.
A Saudi diplomat told AFP that the crown prince would discuss “regional and international files and the future of international cooperation” during the tour.
Other sources told Reuters and Saudi Gazette that MBS would meet Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to discuss the impact the Ukraine crisis on the Middle East, as well as preparations for Mr. Biden’s trip to Saudi Arabia next month.
Separately, Saudi officials quoted by AP indicated that MBS’s visit with al-Sisi will be followed by a meeting with King Abdullah of Jordan in Amman on Tuesday.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced last week that he would meet with MBS in Ankara on Wednesday.
Saudi officials have not officially commented on the crown prince’s regional tour. Salman is also expected to visit Greece, Cyprus and Algeria, “probably in late July,” according to AFP’s diplomatic source.
The visit to Turkey will be MBS’s first trip to the country since the killing and dismemberment of Saudi-born journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018. Turkish officials and US intelligence blamed Riyadh and MBS for the killing, with the incident causing relations between Riyadh and Ankara, already strained by regional disagreements, to cool further. However, Erdogan never accused MBS personally of responsibility for the crime.
MBS took formal responsibility for Khashoggi’s slaying, “because it happened under my watch,” but Riyadh dubbed the killing itself a “rogue operation”, arresting and trying eight people to between 7 and 20 years in prison for the murder. Five other former officials previously convicted of involvement in the crime and sentenced to death were pardoned.
President Biden, who vowed to make Riyadh and MBS “pay the price” and to treat them like “the pariah that they are” over Khashoggi’s killing on the campaign trail in 2019, has had a difficult go of wriggling his way out of harsh media questions about his plans for a one-on-one meeting with MBS next month.
“I’m not going to meet with MBS, I’m going to an international meeting. MBS is going to be part of it, just like there were people part of the discussion today,” Biden told reporters at the White House on Friday.
However, both the Saudi Embassy in Washington, DC and Biden’s press secretary Karine-Jean Pierre have confirmed that the US president’s visit to the kingdom would include a one-on-one sit down with MBS.
Biden will arrive in Saudi Arabia on 15 July for a two-day visit which will include participation in the Gulf Cooperation Council+3 summit of Arab Gulf states, plus Egypt, Jordan and Iraq.
Last month, Axios reported that Washington was looking to broker a deal between Egypt and Saudi Arabia over a pair of islands in the Strait of Tiran as part of a broader push by Washington to normalize Saudi-Israeli relations. Publicly, Riyadh has insisted that it would not restore ties with Tel Aviv until the Palestinian issue was resolved.
Earlier Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz announced that Tel Aviv has been quietly working with US assistance on the creation of a “Middle East Air Defense Alliance” against Iran, and that Arab countries were involved. Gantz did not mention any country by name but expressed “hope that we will take another step forward in this aspect during President Biden’s important visit.”