Thread by @thomasjuneau

There is growing attention to the case of Saad al-Jabri, a former high ranking Saudi official who has fled to Canada. Two of his kids are apparently jailed in Saudi to pressure him to return. Here is a quick recap of what we know with links to key articles.

-The first piece to raise the issue back in March is this by @daniaakkad (his name had come up in the media before, but this is the first to link him to Canada as far as I know, though I may be wrong).

middleeasteye.net/news/exclusive…

Then, @NYTBen discloses that two of his children have been jailed in Saudi Arabia to pressure Al-Jabri to return. Al-Jabri was very close to former Crown Prince and Interior Minister Mohammed bin Nayef, who Crown Prince MbS has aggressively pushed aside.

nytimes.com/2020/05/21/wor…

The BBC also got onto the story, with a bit of detail about his situation in Canada. What is interesting at this point is how this is only international media covering the issue.

bbc.com/news/world-mid…

Very good @hrw report on the issue:

hrw.org/news/2020/05/2…

Then @IgnatiusPost writes this, with more detail (though I should add here that a number of Saudis, including dissidents in exile, might not agree with the label "hero").

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/…

Yesterday, finally, the first story in the Canadian media (that I know of), in French. We know very little about the Canadian angle to this story.

plus.lapresse.ca/screens/d5cc89…

And this morning, @guardian has its own story, also focusing on MbS jailing his children in Saudi to pressure Al-Jabri.

theguardian.com/world/2020/jun…

On the Canadian angle, a key question is whether the fact that Al-Jabri was already in Canada at the time of the dispute between Canada and Saudi Arabia in August 2018 help explain MbS's completely over-the-top reaction to 2 tweets by Canada's foreign ministry on human rights.

At he time, of course, it was not publicly known that Al-Jabri was in Canada. Did it matter? Basically, I don't know. There is simply no publicly available information that would allow me to answer that question one way or the other. The only thing I can say with some...

confidence is that what we do know (the tweets were only the catalyst, MbS was already agree at Canada because of unfulfilled promises of the $15B LAV deal, and he viewed Canada as an easy target to send the message to the west not to criticze him) seems to me an accaptable...

..explanation, in the sense that it is plausible that the Al-Jabri case played only a limited role in MbS's sudden anger. It *might* have played a more important role; that is also plausible, but we don't know that yet.

My WaPo piece on the dispute:

washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-ca…

And the longer version:

journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…

(strange typo in the 4th to last tweet in the thread, MbS was of course "angry" at Canda, not "agree"...

More on the Saad Al-Jabri story, with the @nationalpost, with 2 quotes from me:

“Saudi Arabia has gone after dissidents abroad … this did not begin with MBS... not just assassinations and renditions, but pressure more broadly... it does it a lot”

nationalpost.com/news/children-…

“It’s really difficult to say,” where Aljabri’s presence in Canada fits into the foreign affairs picture, Juneau said. “Relations are bad,” he said. “This is probably just one more hurdle, but it’s not the only one.”

By @tylerrdawson

New details in this @globeandmail piece by @Colinfreeze on the Saad Al-Jabri case:
-“Canada is home, it’s a safe haven, but none of us sought asylum,” (his son) Dr. Aljabri said. He said his family... immigrated through standard processes...
theglobeandmail.com/canada/article…

...Some of my family members including my dad are only a few months away from becoming Canadian citizens” (says Al-Jabri's son, @JabriMD)
- Dr. Aljabri says the kingdom later filed extradition requests for his father that went nowhere. The family dreads the prospect of...

...Saudi agents coming to Canada target them. “There have been genuine concerns about attempts to induce harm,” Dr. Aljabri said, without going into details.

More attention in Canadian media on the Saad Al-Jabri case, by @RaniaMassoud, this time from a different angle: his presence in Canada anger Saudi dissidents here, because of his senior role in the Saudi security apparatus for decades.

ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/17097…

8 Saudi dissidents recently even sent a letter to Immigration Canada asking the government t oreject any asylum request on his part because of his alleged role in repressing and torurturing opposition members. Radio-Canada obtained a copy of the letter.

My quote in the article (in French): this puts the Canadian government - which as a general rule prefers not to talk about Saudi - in an uncomfortable position (ie, dispute with Saudi since 2018, still unresolved; major arms sale resumed in April; to which you add this case)