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A Turkish judge on Thursday decided to hand over to Saudi Arabia the delicate case of the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in Istanbul in 2018. His partner Hatice Cengiz will appeal.
The decision was expected. A Turkish judge decided Thursday, April 7, to bring back to Saudi Arabia the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in Istanbul in October 2018, at the kingdom’s consulate.
“We have decided to transfer the case to Saudi Arabia,” said the judge of the Istanbul court, which has tried 26 Saudi defendants in absentia since July 2020.
The suspense is very limited: Turkey’s justice minister, Bekir Bozdag, has spoken positively of the prosecutor’s request that he wants to “close and hand over the dossier to Riyadh”.
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Jamal Khashoggi was murdered, killed and dismembered at the Saudi consulate, poisoning relations between the two Sunni regional powers. But Turkey is in the midst of an economic crisis and has been seeking reconciliation with Saudi Arabia for months.
For Me Gokmen Baspinar, a lawyer for Khashoggi’s fiancée, “the decision to transfer the files violated the law” and “constituted a violation of Turkish sovereignty”.
decision to appeal
“Saudi Arabia has not prosecuted. The Saudi authorities have concluded trials and decided to acquit many suspects,” he recalled, adding that he had appealed to the Ankara Administrative Court against the ministry’s decision.
For another defender, May Ali Seran, the decision amounted to “throwing a lamb into a wolf’s mouth”.
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Hatice Cengiz, the fiancée of Jamal Khashoggi murdered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, has announced that she is appealing the transfer of documents to Saudi Arabia.
“We are not ruled by one family here like in Saudi Arabia. We have a judicial system that can respond to citizen grievances: so we will appeal,” she told reporters.
with AFP