US President Donald Trump told reporters on Thursday he would not support a move to halt arms sales to Saudi Arabia in response to the disappearance of Washington Post columnist and US resident Jamal Khashoggi.
WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 11th October, 2018) US President Donald Trump told reporters on Thursday he would not support a move to halt arms sales to Saudi Arabia in response to the disappearance of Washington Post columnist and US resident Jamal Khashoggi.
When asked whether he would consider halting arms sales to the kingdom, Trump said, "Not in favor of stopping a country from spending $110 billion, which is an all-time record and letting Russia have that money ... There are other things we could do."
He added that if the US halted its supply of weapons, Saudi Arabia would simply buy weapons from Russia and China, and this would not be good for Washington and would therefore be unacceptable.
Trump said his administration does not like the fact that such incident involving a US resident occurred, but he reiterated his call to find out who was responsible for the journalist's disappearance before making any decisions.�
In an earlier interview with Fox news on Wednesday, Trump said halting arms sales with Riyadh would hurt the American economy and the defense sector.
Khashoggi has been missing since October 2, when he visited the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to obtain documents needed for his upcoming marriage. Turkish authorities reportedly believe that Khashoggi was murdered at the consulate, but Saudi Arabia has denied the allegations.
