US President Joe Biden has promised accountability after a US intelligence report concluded Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey, to "capture or kill" dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
The partly redacted report, newly declassified by Mr Biden's administration, concluded that the Prince "approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey to capture or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi".
"Since 2017, the Crown Prince has had absolute control of the Kingdom's security and intelligence organisations, making it highly unlikely that Saudi officials would have carried out an operation of this nature without the Crown Prince's authorisation," read the report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Khashoggi, a columnist for the Washington Post who had criticised the Crown Prince's policies, was last seen entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018.
Turkish authorities said Khashoggi was suffocated and his body dismembered in a pre-meditated killing soon after entering the consulate.
His remains have not been found.
Joe Biden pledges 'strong and transparent' US-Saudi relations
Mr Biden spoke with the Prince's father, King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, prior to the US intelligence report's release.
Mr Biden told US Spanish-language Univision in an interview that he told King Salman the US would "hold them accountable for human rights abuses".
"I made it clear to him that the rules are changing and we're going to be announcing significant changes today and on Monday," Mr Biden was quoted as saying.
"It's outrageous what happened," he added.
According to a statement from the White House, Mr Biden "affirmed the importance the United States places on universal human rights and the rule of law".
Mr Biden also "told King Salman he would work to make the bilateral relationship as strong and transparent as possible".
"The two leaders affirmed the historic nature of the relationship and agreed to work together on mutual issues of concern and interest," the statement said.
The US intelligence report said a 15-member Saudi team that arrived in Istanbul in October 2018 included "seven members of Mohammed bin Salman's elite personal protective detail", known as the Rapid Intervention Force.
"Although Saudi officials had pre-planned an unspecified operation against Khashoggi we do not know how far in advance Saudi officials decided to harm him."
Saudi Arabia rejects findings as UN calls for greater sanctions
The Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it "completely rejects" what it called a "negative, false and unacceptable assessment" presented by the US intelligence report.
"It is truly unfortunate that this report, with its unjustified and inaccurate conclusions, is issued while the Kingdom had clearly denounced this heinous crime," a statement said.
Meanwhile, the US Department of Treasury have announced sanctions against the Rapid Intervention Force and Ahmad Hassan Mohammed al-Asiri, a close confidant of the Crown Prince and deputy head of the Saudi military intelligence at the time Khashoggi was murdered.
No sanctions against Prince Mohammed himself were announced.
"The United States Government should impose sanctions against the Crown Prince, as it has done for the other perpetrators — targeting his personal assets but also his international engagements," UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions Agnes Callamard said in a statement.
"I call on the government of Saudi Arabia to disclose whether his remains were destroyed onsite or how and where they were disposed," she added.
Khashoggi's family filed a US lawsuit in October 2020 accusing the Prince and other senior Saudi officials of a "brutal and brazen crime" that was the result of "weeks of planning".
Before he was murdered, Khashoggi had arrived at the Saudi consulate to obtain documents allowing him to marry his fiancee Hatice Cengiz, a Turkish national.
"Jamal believed anything was possible in America and I place my trust in the American civil justice system to obtain a measure of justice and accountability," Ms Cengiz said last year.
A United Nations report released in 2019 found there was "credible evidence" the Crown Prince was liable for Khashoggi's killing.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and other Turkish authorities said the murder could not have taken place without approval from the "highest levels" of the Saudi government.
A Saudi court jailed eight people involved in Khashoggi's killing in September 2020.
The International Federation of Journalists said at the time that the ruling was a "shocking denial of justice" to Khashoggi's family because it fell "far short" of international standards of due process.
