** Sultan bin Turki II .. trusted bin Salman and got on the plane that he sent to him .. then he disappeared
The American “vanity fair” magazine revealed new details that are narrated for the first time in which it confirmed that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had kidnapped a Saudi royal who was residing in Europe in 2015 and forcibly returned him to Riyadh in retaliation for the widespread criticism he made. To King Salman and his son and accusing them of corruption.
The American magazine said in a report entitled, “This plane will not land in Cairo: Prince Sultan boarded it from Paris .. then he disappeared.” Prince Sultan bin Turki II cut off from him all expenses, petty cash and cash allocated by the Saudi royal family to its members residing abroad, after His criticism of the bin Salman regime.
While the magazine confirmed that the band that carried out the kidnapping was headed by the advisor at the royal court “at the time” Saud Al-Qahtani – known in Gulf circles as “Dulim – and very close to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who later met the delegation accompanying Prince Sultan bin Turki after his kidnapping.” To sign a declaration from them stating that the kidnapping process and the events that accompanied it were not authorized. Some of them were lured with money and allowed to return to their countries.
In her recounting of the details that preceded the disappearance of the Saudi prince from view, she said that Prince Sultan bin Turki received an invitation from his father to visit him in Cairo, and when Sultan began to travel, a plane sent him to take him and his entourage to Cairo, and something did not seem normal as the crew was It consists of 19 people, which is twice the usual number on such trips, and all the crew were men, and some of them were of strong physique.
Due to the fact that the matter raises suspicion and suspicion, one of Prince Sultan’s security personnel asked him not to board the plane and that it was a trap to arrest him, but the Prince did not listen to him, as he was eager to see his father and that the plane was sent by bin Salman and assumed the Sultan of good will and that he could trust Ibn His newly ascended uncle who became the most powerful member of the royal family.
But perhaps the security man’s warning was serious, as two hours after the plane took off, the plane changed its destination from Cairo to Saudi Arabia, to find the prince and his entourage in the capital, Riyadh.
Sultan bin Turki II, like bin Salman, is the grandson of the founder of the kingdom, who was born to live on the sidelines of the royal family and his father, Turki II, was a potential heir to the throne, but he married the daughter of a Sufi leader, and in the Saudi ruling family’s custom, Sufism is considered unacceptable, and they calibrated Prince Turki with that in his exile where he moved To stay in a hotel in Cairo for several years.
Despite all these circumstances in which Prince Sultan bin Turki lived, he maintained strong relations with his powerful relatives, as he married his cousin, whose father Abdullah became king, but she died in a car accident in 1990, and then Sultan, who was 22 years old, adopted the method Free life.
Sultan bin Turki received a generous bonus from his uncle, King Fahd, who had a special love and affection. When King Fahd left the hospital in Geneva after an eye surgery in 2002, Sultan was pushing the king’s wheelchair and this situation is very special for members of the Saudi royal family who compete to get closer to The king.
Sultan did not occupy any government position, but he liked to be seen as an influential figure, and he had spoken with foreign journalists about his views on Saudi politics and was open to most princes, but he supported the monarchy, and in January 2003 Sultan veered in a different direction, as he told reporters that Saudi Arabia should stop providing aid to Lebanon and he claimed that former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is using Saudi money and living an expensive lifestyle with it.
These criticisms echoed against the royal court, such as the “Molotov bomb”, where the Hariri family had strong relations with the rulers of the Kingdom, especially with Abdulaziz, the son of King Fahd. The Associated Press said that he has begun forming a committee to eradicate corruption among Saudi princes and others who “have plundered the nation’s wealth over the past 25 years.”
About a month later, Abdel Aziz sent an invitation to Sultan: He told him: Come to King Fahd’s Palace in Geneva, and let us resolve our differences. At the meeting, Abdulaziz tried to convince Sultan to return to the kingdom. When he refused, the guards pounced on the prince, injected him with a sedative, and then dragged him onto a plane bound for Riyadh. Sultan weighed 400 pounds and was dragged unconscious and damaged the nerves connected to the diaphragm and legs, and after that Sultan spent the next 11 years in and out of prisons in Saudi Arabia and sometimes in a closed government hospital in Riyadh.
In 2014, Sultan contracted swine flu, followed by complications that threatened his life, and assuming that the prince, who had become almost paralyzed, no longer represented a threat to the royal family, the government allowed him to travel to receive treatment in Massachusetts, USA, to become free.
In 2005, tremendous changes swept the Al Saud family, where King Fahd died, so his successor Abdullah became king and he was the father of Sultan’s deceased wife, so the new king reduced the expenses and spending directed at princes, and he criticized princes who lived in extravagance and misappropriation of money and brag about that.
But it seems that Sultan did not understand this transformation or the biggest transformation that occurred in early 2015, after he recovered from his serious health problems, and when King Salman assumed the throne, instead of living a low-cost and miscellaneous life, Sultan performed liposuction and ligation of his stomach to reduce his weight and surgery Cosmetic and he began to recreate and resume a life full of luxury. He communicated with security men and old advisers who had not spoken with them since before his abduction more than a decade ago, and after his retinue was reunited, Prince Sultan set out for Europe like any Saudi prince in the 1990s.
In mid-2015, Sultan stayed in a luxury hotel on the most beautiful beaches of Sardinia on the Mediterranean, and his legs were partially paralyzed, and the royal court continued to deposit money in his bank account and Prince Sultan realized that these payments would stop in the end, and he had no other source of income. Therefore, he set up a plan in which he decided to sue the Saudi government and demand that it pay him financial compensation for the injuries he suffered during his kidnapping in 2003.
The royal court stopped depositing money in Sultan’s account and became in debt more than a million dollars to the hotel in which he resides and he cannot leave, while a member of his entourage told him that he was completely bankrupt. He tried to communicate with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, but failed. Bin Salman would not pay someone who caused him many problems because of the complaints that Sultan made to the media, and in the summer of 2015 Sultan took an unprecedented step in the history of the Kingdom by filing a lawsuit in a Swiss court against members of the Saudi royal family for his kidnapping in 2003.
Sultan took an adventure and tried to outwit Muhammad bin Salman, in the Saudi royal family the king’s brothers have a say in the succession process if it is proven that the king is incompetent and his brothers have the right to remove him from the throne, and Sultan took advantage of that and sent two anonymous letters to his uncles in which he wrote to them that their brother the king Salman is “incompetent” and “helpless” and became a puppet of his son Muhammad. He also told them that Mohammed bin Salman was corrupt and transferred $ 2 billion of Saudi government funds to a private account and told them that the only solution is for the brothers to remove the king and hold an emergency meeting For senior members of the ruling family to discuss the situation and take all necessary measures to save the country.
Although the leaked letters published by the British Guardian newspaper did not bear any signature, officials of the Saudi royal court quickly recognized the author, so the Crown Prince decided to return him to Riyadh and imprison him again, and sought the help of his advisor in the royal court, Saud Al-Qahtani, who was accused “later” In the case of the assassination of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018, to carry out this mission.
At that time, Sultan was waiting for the repercussions and perhaps his uncles might try to restrain Muhammad, or perhaps bin Salman would offer him money to stop stirring up trouble, and Sultan assumed that he could get the same status as his father and that he could live in exile in good financial condition by his powerful cousins. .
The American magazine said in its detailed report that, surprisingly, it seemed as if Sultan’s plan began to work, where, a short time after the letters were published, more than two million dollars from the royal court appeared in Sultan’s bank account, so he paid the hotel and made plans for his travel, especially since he received an invitation from his father to visit Cairo. His father told him that as a reward, the royal court would send him a luxurious plane to take him and his accompanying delegation from Paris to Cairo, but in secret, it appears that Muhammad Ibn Saman was seeking to return his “lost cousin to the hangar.”
With all these repercussions, Sultan’s employees were astonished, as the last time he criticized the House of Saud, he found himself on board a plane belonging to the royal court and then kidnapped him and exposed him to life-long health problems, so how could Prince Sultan think about boarding the plane again? .. But apparently Sultan was keen to believe that reconciliation is proceeding in full swing and I believe that bin Salman is a leader of a new type who will not solve a family dispute by kidnapping.
Fenty Fair said that the royal court sent a specially equipped 737-800 aircraft – which seats 189 passengers for commercial use – and Sultan ordered his staff to meet the crew and find out about the situation. The crew members looked more like security officials than were stewards. This plane will not land in Cairo. ” Sultan answered him: “Do you not trust them?” The employee answered him, “Why do you trust them?” At that time, Sultan did not answer the question, but he hesitated until the captain of the plane offered to remove his fear of leaving 10 crew members in Paris as a goodwill gesture and to show that it would not be a hijacking, and that was enough for Prince Sultan.
Then the Emir told the delegation accompanying him to start packing the bags, and the number of his entourage was more than 12, including servants, nurses and security guards, then the plane left Paris, and its flight path to Cairo remained for two hours and was visible on the screens inside the cabin, then suddenly the screens went out and Sultan’s employees were annoyed, and he asked One of them is the captain of the plane, telling him what is happening? The captain told him there was a technical problem and that the only engineer who could fix it was among the crew members who had left in Paris, and the captain told them: No need to worry.
With the passage of time, the plane began to land, and everyone on board realized that it would not land in Cairo, and they did not see the Nile River or the pyramids of Giza, but they saw the towers of the city of Riyadh, where the Kingdom Tower appeared, and then the members of the delegation accompanying the Sultan of non-Saudis demanded to know what would happen to them, and they landed in Saudi Arabia Without a visa and against their will, Prince Sultan, who looked weak, shouted: “Give me my rifle!” One of his guards refused. Captain Saud’s men were carrying rifles, and it seemed that an exchange of fire on board a plane was worse than what might happen on the ground, so Sultan sat in silence until the plane landed, there was no way to fight, and Captain Saud’s men pushed the Prince down the Underground basement. This was the last time anyone in his entourage saw him.
The security men kept Sultan’s entourage, consisting of security guards and employees, in an airport holding area, and in the end, they were transferred to a hotel where they stayed for three days, unable to leave without obtaining visas.
Finally, on the fourth day, the security guards brought the entourage to a government office. One by one the aliens were called into a sprawling conference room with a huge table in the middle. On his head was Captain Saud, wearing a dress instead of a captain pilot, then he said to them: “I am Saud Al-Qahtani, I work in the royal court.”
In its definition of him, the American magazine Fenty Fair said that Saud Al-Qahtani was known to the Saudis as Mr. Hashtag for his intense presence on social media, as he praised and praised Bin Salman on Twitter and belittled his critics, and with the kidnapping of Sultan, Saud Al-Qahtani became a major player in the security apparatus of the royal court A person who bin Salman can count on to accomplish sensitive and aggressive missions.
The American magazine said that the kidnapping of the Sultan silenced an annoying critic and served as a warning to any potential dissident from the Saudi ruling family and what could happen to him.
In the conclusion of its report, the American magazine Vanity Fair said that after 5 years the full story of the kidnapping of Sultan bin Turki will become clearer in another court case against members of the Saudi royal family, where Saad al-Jabri, a former Saudi intelligence man living in exile in Canada, filed a lawsuit against Muhammad Bin Salman, the Saudi crown prince, in a US federal court in August 2020, claiming that bin Salman tried to kill him at the hands of an international assassination squad called the “Tiger Squad”.
In the lawsuit, former Saudi intelligence chief Saad al-Jabri confirmed that the roots of the band date back to 2015, and the lawsuit states that bin Salman asked him to form a Saudi counterterrorism squad and use it in an extrajudicial retaliation operation against a Saudi prince who lives in Europe and criticizes King Salman, in reference to the prince. Sultan bin Turki II.
Al-Jabri said in his lawsuit that the operation was “immoral and illegal” and damaging the reputation of Saudi Arabia. The lawsuit says that bin Salman established the Tiger Squad and appointed Saud Al-Qahtani to run it. Two years later, it was the Tiger Squad that would kill the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, according to what US officials said, and this incident tarnished bin Salman’s international reputation, as it was a dangerous message to the Saudis to remind them of what would happen to them if they criticized bin Salman. Despite all this information, the Saudi judiciary has not charged Saud Al-Qahtani with any charges.
