Saudi Arabian authorities fired the editor in chief of a leading reformist newspaper Tuesday allegedly after an influential cleric issued a religious edict calling for a mass boycott of the daily. Saudi editors at Al-Watan daily, which is owned by a member of the royal Al-Saud family, said editor in chief Jamal Khashoggi had been sacked on Monday evening, hours after Sheikh Abdullah bin Abdul Rahman al-Jibrin issued an edict saying the paper had ridiculed âvirtuousâ people.
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This followed a campaign launched by the Arabic-language Al-Watan against the powerful religious leaders of the ultra-conservative kingdom, and was seen by many journalists as an indication of a power struggle between the strict Muslim establishment and reform-minded officials. Al-Watan has recently published a series of damning articles against the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, the so-called religious police in Saudi Arabia which enforces the kingdomâs austere brand of Islam.
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Khashoggi, who was recently appointed to Al-Watan, is seen as a leading reformist voice in Saudi Arabia. He wrote several editorials condemning religious extremism after the suicide bombings that killed 34 people in Riyadh this month. Like other media in Saudi Arabia, Al-Watan follows strict government guidelines on its editorial content. It is owned by the son of Foreign Affairs Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal. Last year, Saudi authorities fired three editors of local newspapers, including one from Al-Watan, for allegedly printing articles deemed as harmful to the kingdom. This week, Interior Minister Prince Nayef met senior editors of several Saudi newspapers and urged them to avoid publishing news that he said was âdamaging and misleading.â |