US President Donald Trump has vowed “severe punishment” if Saudi Arabia is proven to be behind the purported assassination of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Trump made the remarks in an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” set to be aired on Sunday.
“There will be severe punishment.” In his first 60 Minutes interview since taking office, President Trump tells Lesley Stahl that if Saudi Arabia is found to be responsible for journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s death, there will be consequences. https://t.co/BRZfIPHbNY pic.twitter.com/s6X98AylBR
— 60 Minutes (@60Minutes) October 13, 2018
The US president, however, stopped well short of blaming the Saudi monarchy for the disappearance of Khashoggi, who is suspected of being killed during a visit to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2.
He said that “we don’t know yet” if Khashoggi was murdered, but that the situation is “being looked at very very strongly.”
Trump on…