Tag: Saudis

Saudi Arabia's hunger for weapons, initially aimed at staving off the threat of Iran, has grown with the upcoming US withdrawal from Iraq and...

Hardline Saudi cleric Sheikh Youssef bin Abdallah al-Ahmed, known for his controversial views on Saudi society, was arrested on Friday, Saudi activists told Reuters...

After the Saudi authorities refused to repatriate both the widows of Osama bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader’s family is likely to be sent...

Fearing both civil war and sweeping political reform as results of the crisis in Yemen, Saudi Arabia is struggling with its role as regional...

Saudi authorities have rejected claims that holy Zamzam water from a spring inside the Grand Mosque complex of Mecca is polluted and stressed there...

LAHORE - Jamaat Ahl-e-Hadith Senior Vice President (Central) Allama Zubair Ahmad Zaheer said that if Raymond Davis like terrorist was caught in Saudi Arabia, then he would have been beheaded at the earliest.
People who are naming Saudi Arabia for the release of Davis cannot be friends of Islam and Pakistan and they cannot digest the friendly relations of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. He also claimed that Saudi Arab never interfered in the internal matters of Pakistan.
He was

RIYADH - Dozens of Saudi men gathered outside the Interior Ministry in the capital Riyadh on Sunday to demand the release of jailed relatives, amid a heavy police presence.
Some were seen arguing with police but were not shouting slogans or holding protest signs. At least 50 police cars surrounded the ministry, and three men were seen by a Reuters witness being put into police cars.
"We have seen at least three or four police vehicles taking people away," said an activist

BASRA - Thousands of Iraqis protested in the southern oil hub of Basra on Saturday against the presence of Saudi troops in Bahrain, which has highlighted Iraq's own sectarian divide after years of war. Anger has been mounting among Shias in Iraq, Lebanon and Iran over the movement of troops from Sunni Arab states to help Bahrain's Sunni royal family stifle pro-democracy demonstrations by majority Shias. Bahrain said on Friday more troops were coming from other Gulf states to help

GENEVA - The office of the UN human rights chief on Friday urged Saudi Arabia to exercise restraint and allow free assembly, as protests were planned in the kingdom to press for democratic reform. "We are concerned about what may happen later today in Saudi Arabia, where the situation is very tense," said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay. "As in other similar situations in the Middle East, we're calling for restraint on the part of the

RIYADH - Saudi King Abdullah unveiled a series of benefits for Saudis, estimated to be worth $35 billion on his returning home Wednesday after three months medical treatment. The action plan which includes funding to offset high inflation, help young unemployed people and support families to get affordable housing was made as popular protests over poverty, corruption and repression-hit many Arab countries.
Hundreds of men in white robes performed a traditional Bedouin sword dance

DOHA - Saudi Arabia axed coach Nasser Al Johar after just two games on Tuesday and vowed to replace him with a high-profile international name as the fallout from their dismal Asian Cup intensified.
The country also accepted the resignation of team manager Fahd Al-Misaibeeh and his staff, the Saudi state news agency SPA, monitored here, said.
It followed the former regional powerhouse's humiliating 5-0 defeat by Japan on Monday, which left them bottom of their group with

ISLAMABAD: A US diplomatic cable relapsed by WikiLeaks claims that ANP President Asfandyar Wali accused the PML-N of distributing "cash-filled envelops", funded by Saudi Arabia, to party-backed lawyers during the lawyers movement and the long march in March 2009.
The cable, sent on March 12, 2009 by the then US ambassador Anne W Patterson, details her meeting with Asfandyar, who along with JUI-F Chief Fazlur Rehman, was mediating between President Asif Zardari and Nawaz Sharif to

ISLAMABAD: One of the diplomatic cables leaked by WikiLeaks revealed that Pakistan's Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Umar Khan Alisherzai thinks that the relations between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were strained after President Asif Zardari's elections.
The Saudi perception was that Zardari was pro-Iranian and pro-Shia, which made Saudi Arabia apprehensive about working with him. "When asked about the Saudi-Pak relationship, Alisherzai admitted that it had been strained since

ISLAMABAD: The government of Saudi Arabia had fully supported former president Pervez Musharraf's rule, although it also offered protection to the Sharif family.
According to WikiLeaks, authorities in Saudi Arabia backed Musharraf's rule and also worked with the former army general to have PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif arrested if he returned from exile.
"We can either support Musharraf and stability, or we can allow bin Laden to get the bomb," Saudi Ambassador to the US Adel