The CEO of Saudi Arabia’s controversial LIV golf tournament acknowledged Friday that Saudi officials played a role in the killing of Washington Post reporter Jamal Khashoggi, adding: “I think everyone learns from their mistakes.”
The “mistakes” would refer to the 2018 killing and dismemberment of Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where he and the Saudi writer went to obtain a document to marry his Turkish fiancee.
In an interview with NewsNation on Thursday, when asked about Khashoggi’s killing and human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia, LIV CEO Greg Norman, a retired Australian professional golfer and entrepreneur, said: “Look, I think everybody learns from their mistakes”. In an interview with NewsNation in May, Norman called Khashoggi’s killing a “mistake.”
Norman said he was in Saudi Arabia building a golf course before becoming managing director of LIV Golf, which he said was “long before all this who-ha-ha broke out”.
He insisted that the Saudis see the Gulf as a “force for good”. Norman added: “Gulf diplomacy is something I have been extremely passionate about for more than a quarter of a century.”
US intelligence has determined that the killing of Khashoggi, a critical dissident of the Saudi royal family, was ordered by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly defended the Crown Prince against the allegations.
The LIV tournament is seen as part of a so-called “sports washing” campaign by troubled regimes in an attempt to clean up their bloody reputations.
The LIV organization, funded by the Saudi sovereign wealth fund, is believed to have paid Trump millions of dollars to host his events at his golf resorts. Trump’s son-in-law and former senior White House adviser, Jared Kushner, received a massive $2 billion investment from the Saudis for a fund he started despite his lack of investment experience.
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