Saudi Arabia has hit back at a U.S. Senate resolution to end U.S. military support for the war in Yemen and blame the Saudi crown prince for the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
“The Kingdom condemns the latest position of the U.S. Senate that was based on unsubstantiated allegations and rejects the blatant interference in its internal affairs,” the foreign ministry said in a statement released by the official Saudi Press Agency.
The Senate delivered a rare double rebuke to U.S. President Donald Trump on Saudi Arabia last week, voting to end American military support for the war in Yemen.
It also condemned Khashoggi’s death and called Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, “responsible” for it.
Riyadh warned that it would not tolerate any “disrespect” of its rulers. “This position by the U.S. Senate sends the wrong messages to all those who want to cause a rift in Saudi-U.S. relationship,” the Saudi ministry said.
The Senate resolution acknowledged that the U.S.-Saudi relations were “important,” but it called on the kingdom to “moderate its increasingly erratic foreign policy.”
Khashoggi, a contributor to the Washington Post, was killed Oct. 2 shortly after entering the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul in what Riyadh has called a “rogue” operation.
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