Justice in the days of the coronavirus and the Khashoggi case

While the whole world is preoccupied with an agenda determined by a virus, there are also developments that remind us that life goes on.

Without doubt, one of the most important and longest-lasting subjects on the agenda of last year was the Khashoggi murder. The case of the famous journalist-writer Jamal Khashoggi, who, when he went to Saudi Arabia's Istanbul Consulate General to obtain a marriage document, was strangled to death by a 15-person team that was waiting there to kill him, that had come from Saudi Arabia on two private planes, planned, with their instructions already received, and whose body was then dismembered and destroyed, never left the agenda for a year and a half. All developments related to the incident were followed with interest in the world media and in political circles.

For SA, which was engaged in a serious PR effort to present itself to the world as the perfect and likable representative of moderate Islam, this incident was a turning point that washed off all its makeup. Beneath this makeup there emerged a dirty abuse of the discourse of "terrorism" or "Islamic extremism" for its struggle against its own legitimate and moderate opponents, indeed against those who were not even opponents but whom it saw as possible alternatives to its own rule. Scholars such as Salman al-Awdah, Khatib Awad al-Qarni, and Ali al-Omari had not yet opened their mouths against the King or the crown prince to say even a single word. The reason for their arrest was not that they were extremists either; on the contrary, everyone knows that they were among the most open-minded scholars of the Islamic world, with the greatest intellectual depth. Perhaps their only fault was that they had not applauded the crown prince's practices and had not showered him with praise. What was done to them was the real situation behind the "moderate" face that PR effort had made up. The Khashoggi incident enabled this to come out in all its dimensions.

The Khashoggi murder was committed on Istanbul soil, but all of those identified as having committed the murder had already returned to where they had come from, long before the first identifications. That is why how the justice that the whole world was awaiting and demanding would be established had turned into a serious question. The case opened by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office was proceeding slowly, because all the suspects were outside and the body was not available. SA, for its part, had decided that, since the incident had taken place on its own territory as a diplomatic area, it would conduct the trial of the suspects itself.

But from the beginning no one expected a just verdict to come out of the SA court, which accepted the incident only as information was revealed in ways that could not be denied and whose entire effort was to cover up the role of certain usual suspects and to protect certain people. Indeed, the first indictment of the case that was opened had most clearly signaled its verdict by saying that names such as Kahtani and Asiri, who, let alone the crown prince, can hardly be imagined not to have directly assigned the murder team, had been seen to have no role in this incident.

Indeed, in the case concluded in December, the verdict given from the very beginning was confirmed, and it was said that "since no evidence had been found that would incriminate Kahtani and Asiri, a case had not even been opened." In that case, the investigation opened against 31 people continued concentrated on 11 people, and 5 people were sentenced to death, 3 to 24 years in prison, and three were acquitted. It had been concluded that the murder was not committed with intent and planning, that it occurred as a result of a sudden altercation, and that only the 5 persons in question were directly involved in the incident and that no one else had any guilt whatsoever in it.

We too had described this verdict as one "like openly killing Khashoggi once more." It was a verdict that made a mockery of human intelligence. Of course, in the face of this verdict, which on the other hand was not surprising, we had also said that the real case was being conducted by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office and that it was its word that should really be awaited.

Indeed, last Wednesday the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office announced with a press statement that the first phase of the case, which it had completed from the evidence it had been gathering for a long time, had been opened. According to the press statement, Asiri and Kahtani are accused, as the suspects who made the assignment to carry out the act of killing Khashoggi and gave the other suspects the necessary instructions, of "Instigating Intentional Killing with Premeditation and by Torturing with a Monstrous Feeling," while the other 18 people are accused of "Intentional Killing with Premeditation and by Torturing with a Monstrous Feeling." According to the notice, the defendants acted from the very beginning with unity of ideas and a joint decision to commit the crime, made the planning and division of labor regarding all the details of the act, reinforced and complemented one another during the execution of the act in order to carry out this plan, took part directly in the crime by contributing effectively and functionally to its commission, and as a result strangled to death the victim Jamal Khashoggi, whom they had brought into their joint domain of control.

The most important detail of the notice is the statement that "the investigation file has been separated for the purpose of identifying the other suspects." These suspects were referred to, taking into consideration the scope of the killing and the manner of commission of the crime, as "those who directly took part in the act of intentional killing, those who instigated this crime, and those who destroyed evidence in order to prevent the crime from coming to light," and it is stated that the investigation is continuing separately on this separated file.

These statements indicate that the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office will not give up the pursuit however far the investigation extends.

What can we say, may God bring it to completion. May justice be done. Justice harms no one, and even what develops against it, in the final analysis, it revives.