Saad al-Jabri: what ex-spymaster’s poison ring claims mean for UK-Saudi relations

Saudi Arabia’s crown prince wanted to use a “poison ring” to kill the kingdom’s then ruler King Abdullah so that his own father could take the throne, a former top Saudi intelligence official has claimed.

Exiled spymaster Saad al-Jabri told CBS that Mohammed bin Salman tried to enlist then security chief Prince Mohammed bin Nayef in the assassination plot in 2014, the year before Abdullah died at the age of 90.

“I am here to sound the alarm about a psychopath, killer, in the Middle East with infinite resources, who poses threat to his people, to the Americans and to the planet,” Jabri told the US television channel’s 60 Minute programme.

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Jabri claimed that at a private meeting with bin Nayef, the now crown prince said: “I want to assassinate King Abdullah. I get a poison ring from Russia. It’s enough for me just to shake hand[s] with him and he will be done.”

The alleged threat by by bin Salman – then chief of staff to his father, the now King Salman – was “handled within the royal family”, said Jabri. The former spymaster claimed to have seen a secret recording of the meeting, and that two copies of the video still exist.

Jabri “served as the link” between Western intelligence agencies and former interior minister bin Nayef for years, but fled in 2017 to live in exile in Canada after his boss “fell foul of his cousin ‘MBS’, as the crown prince is known”, said The Times.

During his televised interview, Jabri “also said he had been warned by an associate in 2018, after the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, that a Saudi hit team was heading to Canada to kill him”, The Guardian reported.

Jabri told CBS that he had recorded a video to be released in the event of his death that would expose further “secrets” about MBS and the US.

His claims are the latest in a string of allegations triggered by a feud within the Saudi royal family that is “threatening to embarrass the United States and other Western allies, including Britain”, said The Times.

The latest row is also a setback for Saudi Arabia, as the kingdom faces renewed scrutiny over its human rights record following the recent takeover of Newcastle United by a Saudi-controlled sovereign wealth fund chaired by MBS.

Speaking to the BBC’s Today programme yesterday, the chair of the UK’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Tom Tugendhat, said that Jabri was a “very credible individual” who has been an “extremely important intelligence partner for the UK”.

But the Tory MP added that Saudi Arabia is a “very important intelligence partner” and an important ally in tackling “the threat of nuclear weapons on Iranian soil”.

MBS and his court are claiming that Jabri embezzled hundreds of millions of dollars from the Saudi counterterrorism budget, and have launched claims against him in the US and Canada. His son, daughter and son-in-law have been jailed in Saudi Arabia.

Jabri, who denies the allegations, claims his family are effectively being held hostage in a bid to force him to return to the kingdom.

Saudi authorities told CBS that Jabri was “a discredited former government official with a long history of fabricating and creating distractions to hide the financial crimes he committed”.