Bessma Momani is a professor at the University of Waterloo and senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation.
In a 100-page report by the UN Special Rapporteur to the High Commissioner for Human Rights, respected scholar Agnes Callamard investigated the death of Washington Post journalist and Saudi political dissident Jamal Khashoggi. The Columbia University professor’s report provides details of Mr. Khashoggi’s gruesome death in a Saudi consulate in Istanbul, points the finger at the Saudi government for premeditated murder, and provides scathing recommendations to hold the people accountable for Mr. Khashoggi’s killing.
The chances of this damning report gaining further traction are slim to none, however. Realpolitik will win this battle. The world – especially oil-loving countries – will largely shrug and return to business as usual with Saudi Arabia.
Prof. Callamard lists numerous laws broken by the Saudi government, among them international human rights law. It also violated the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and broke the terms of the Convention Against Torture, which it has signed. Like much of the international community, Prof. Callamard does not believe that the Saudi authorities, and to a lesser extent the Turks, have properly handled the investigation of Mr. Khashoggi’s killing in accordance with international standards. Indeed, she points to inconsistencies, obstructions and continued woefulness in providing information on the whereabouts of the journalist’s remains.
Providing gruesome details and snippets of conversation between Mr. Khashoggi and his killers, the report leaves little to the imagination of what was clearly a crime scene cleaned by the Saudi hit team and its many accomplices.
In far more polite terms, the report points to Saudi Arabia’s kangaroo courts, which could offer a miscarriage of justice for falsely accused fall guys. Meanwhile, one of the potential masterminds behind the killing, and special adviser to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (also known by the nickname MBS), Saud al-Qahtani was most recently seen touring in nearby Abu Dhabi and is not under arrest in the Kingdom.
He is the same man implicated in the torture of women right’s activists, including my dear friend Loujain al-Hathloul, who languishes unjustly in a Saudi prison. Individual sanctions against the assets of a select few is not enough, the report notes, as it is clear that the “State of Saudi Arabia is ultimately responsible.” Prof. Callamard goes as far as to suggest there is credible evidence of individual liability of MBS himself in Mr. Khashoggi’s death, and this merits further investigation.
The UN report cautions that this is not just about a single journalist. Instead, the murder is “emblematic of a global pattern of targeted killing” of journalists at the hands of states. As hyper-nationalist autocrats rise across the globe, Prof. Callamard’s report is a grim reminder that the perception that powerful leaders have impunity will spread. Beyond financial sanctions imposed by the EU, the United States and Canada on some of the individuals implicated in the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, little has been done to ensure these people are paying for their crimes.
There is no shortage of recommendations in the report. Among them are Saudi Arabia issuing a public apology for Mr. Khashoggi’s death and funding programs to support freedom of expression and a free press in the Arab Gulf region. It also recommends that the UN Secretary General establish a tribunal into his killing, the FBI conduct its own investigation, and countries ban the export and sale of surveillance tools to Saudi Arabia.
Sadly, expect none of these things to materialize.
The news cycle will go on and the international community will effectively sweep this report’s recommendations under the rug and barely put out a whimper to its findings. This is thanks, in part, to support of U.S. President Donald Trump for MBS and the Saudi regime at a time when the Trump administration is more concerned with rallying Middle Eastern and European governments behind its maximum-pressure campaign against Iran.
But make no mistake, the silence of governments who sell arms to the Saudis, including Canada, will be deafening.
The chances of the UN report providing traction for an independent investigation are, unfortunately, low. Next year, Saudi Arabia will host the G20 meetings, and we can expect things to go back to business as usual: smiles and kisses for the crown prince.
When the next journalist is killed at the hands of their government, we cannot say that we were not forewarned.
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