RIYADH —
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
was set to embark on a visit to Greece and France Tuesday, state media
reported, his first Europe trip since the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal
Khashoggi.
اضافة اعلان
Prince Mohammed will meet with the leaders of both
France and Greece “to discuss bilateral relations and ways to enhance them in
various fields,” the official Saudi Press Agency reported, citing a statement
from the royal court.
The trip comes less than two weeks after President
Joe Biden visited the Saudi city of Jeddah for a summit of Arab leaders and met
one-on-one with Prince Mohammed, greeting him with a fist bump.
That move sealed Biden’s retreat from a presidential
election campaign pledge to turn the kingdom into a “pariah” over the Khashoggi
affair and wider human rights controversies.
After Russia’s invasion of
Ukraine triggered a spike
in energy prices earlier this year, Saudi Arabia came under pressure from
Washington and European powers to pump more oil.
Elevated oil prices have been a key factor in
inflation in the US soaring to 40-year highs, putting pressure on the Biden
administration ahead of mid-term elections later this year.
But the world’s biggest crude exporter has resisted
pressure to open the supply taps, citing its commitment to production schedules
determined by the OPEC+ exporting bloc it co-leads with Russia.
In May, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin
Farhan stated that the kingdom had done what it could for the oil market.
Last week French President Emmanuel Macron received
the new president of the energy-rich United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Mohamed bin
Zayed Al-Nahyan, in Paris.
During that trip officials announced a deal between French
energy giant Total Energies and UAE state oil company ADNOC “for cooperation in
the area of energy supplies”.
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