saudi arabia crown prince yacht

Saudi crown prince MBS’s $400 million megayacht has a dedicated snow room for the royal to beat Riyadh’s blistering heat. The mammoth 439 feet long vessel has a saltwater swimming pool, a climbing wall, a submarine, two helipads, and a $450 million Da Vinci painting.

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Photos: Inside Saudi Crown Prince’s USD 400 million superyacht; snowroom and more

The yacht's facilities include seven swimming pools, an underwater viewing room, health spa, saltwater pool, outdoor cinema and a nightclub over the combined 48,000 square feet..

Riyadh : The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, is known for his lavish spending and owning several luxurious properties around the world, including a serene superyacht worth dollars 400 million (Rs 32,74,61,20,000).

The Crown Prince bought the yacht from the previous owner, Russian businessman Yuri Shefler in 2015.

The 134-meter Serene yacht built by Italian shipyard Fincantieri, has many elements inside that make it the masterpiece it is.

The Serene #luxury mega yacht pic.twitter.com/iyUK2gyKBT — Earth 🌍 (@earthescope) March 22, 2015

It can accommodate up to 24 guests in 12 cabins with private decks, and 52 crew members, including the captain, in 30 cabins.

As per a report by luxury launches , the yacht’s facilities include seven swimming pools, an underwater viewing room, a health spa, a saltwater pool, outdoor cinema and a nightclub over the combined 48,000 square feet.

One such standout element is a snow room—cooled to 12 degrees Fahrenheit and featuring real snow falling from the ceiling.

A dedicated children’s playroom makes the ship a family-friendly cruise experience for guests. There is an indoor climbing wall, wet bar and jacuzzi on the top floor.

The yacht also has two helicopter pads. The yacht’s fun features include an on-board pizza oven and teppanyaki grill. Its interior is defined as modern and luxurious with attention to detail.

The yacht offers many social spaces for guests to use and a conference room where they can conduct business on board.

At a distance of 5000 nautical miles, the yacht has a maximum speed of 18 knots and a cruising speed of 14 knots.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi, one of the most expensive works of art ever purchased for 450 million dollars (Rs 36,86,96,25,000) in 2017 (more than the yacht itself), is on display on the yacht.

Prior to the sale of the yacht to the Crown Prince, Serene was provided for charter to select guests. Among them is Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who reportedly rented Serene for 5 million dollars (Rs 40,97,49,500) a week during the summer of 2014.

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SERENE Yacht – Dreamlike $400M Superyacht

The impressive yacht was designed by Espen Øino International, with interior design by Reymond Langton Design.

Built by shipbuilders Fincantieri, SERENE was delivered in 2011 from their Muggiano-based shipyard. The superyacht is the epitome of luxury and offers an excellent yachting experience.

SERENE yacht interior

 British designer  Reymond Langton Design  penned the interior design of the SERENE yacht. The superyacht can accommodate 24 guests across 12 cabins in 1 master suite, 1 VIP, seven doubles, and three twins.

There is accommodation for 62 crew on the 134m yacht that ensures that guests have a lavish and luxurious experience.

The yacht’s amenities include seven swimming pools, an underwater viewing room, and a health spa.

The beach club stretches almost throughout the interior length of the yacht, providing an excellent indoor-outdoor area for guests to enjoy on the water level.

The beach club features one of the most advanced swimming pools built onboard a superyacht.

A dedicated children’s playroom makes the yacht a family-friendly yachting experience for guests. There is an indoor climbing wall, a top deck with a wet bar, and a jacuzzi.

The SERENE yacht has another spa pool on the sun deck for relaxation on the water, surrounded by sun loungers.

The yacht also has two helicopter pads. The fun features of the yacht include a pizza oven and a teppanyaki grill on board. The yacht’s interior is defined as modern and luxurious with attention to detail.

The yacht also features many social spaces for guests to use and a conference room to conduct business on board.

Espen Øino International penned the expert exterior design of the SERENE yacht.

The 134m vessel presents an imposing with six decks, a blue steel hull, and a white aluminum superstructure. She was built by  Fincantieri  in their Muggiano shipyard and delivered in 2011.

An impressive display of underwater lights emphasizes the yacht’s exterior during the night.

The yacht was the first ever to be built by the Italian shipyard, which had primarily focused on commercial ships before. 

Specifications

The 133.9m superrich has a beam of 18.6m and a draft of 5.6m. She has a massive volume of 8321 gross tons powered by 8 MTU engines.

With a range of 5000 nautical miles, she has a maximum speed of 18 knots and a cruising speed of 14 knots.

The SERENE yacht is one of the largest yachts in the world; at the time of her delivery, she was placed at the 9th largest yacht in the world. She has a $25 – $35 million running cost per year.

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Sneak a peek into the lavish interiors of Saudi Crown Prince's yacht

        View this post on Instagram                       A post shared by BENEDETTA IOVANE, The Luxury Yacht Lady (@b.lex_benedettaiovane)

The megayacht owned by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, worth $400 million, features a special snow room for the royal family to relax in during the scorching waves in Riyadh.

It's no secret that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud of Saudi Arabia has refined taste. This is particularly evident in his 133.9-meter yacht Serene, valued at $400 million, which sails as a testament to his taste.

The superyacht offers much more than its robust exterior, high price, and impressive length. Many elements in the interior make Serene a true masterpiece. One prominent feature is the snow room. This special room is cooled to minus 12 degrees and has real snow falling from the ceiling. In addition to the warm Saudi summers, the snow room is ideal for relaxation and a jump into the sauna.

The 133.9-meter yacht from Fincantieri shipyard was the first to include a snow room when it was delivered in 2011. Several motor yachts such as Faith and Ragnar have followed suit, but not all can boast such beautifully executed spaces like Serene.

This work by Reymond Langton Design studio stands out among other striking features and a seemingly endless list of amenities. Interestingly, the snow room is part of Serene thanks to its original owner, Russian oligarch Yuri Shefler. The deep-pocketed owner wanted a room on his yacht where actual snow would fall.

"The clients wanted a place on the yacht where they could enjoy real snow. When the client is from a cold country like Russia, where they're used to ice baths, it's quite normal. However, it's quite incredible to see this fresh, beautiful snow on a yacht—and quite surreal to look out the window into the sun and people in swimsuits."

This Italian-made yacht is so impressive that even billionaire Bill Gates couldn't resist its charms and rented it (for $5 million per week in 2014) for a few days for a family vacation.

        View this post on Instagram                       A post shared by SuperYachtFan (@superyachtfan)

What makes Serene so special that it stands out among a sea of superyachts? Serene is the largest yacht ever built in Italy and has over 400 square meters of interior space spread across seven decks, two helipads, and a hangar. Considering the large families that stay on the yacht Serene, the thoughtful Crown Prince has also installed a children's playground with a climbing wall. Depending on the entertainment needs, one of the two helipads can transform into another pool or dance floor. Serene is available for charter and offers a multitude of fun activities.

The yacht features a "between-decks" slide, an exciting underwater observation room, and plenty of toys. After a day filled with action, relaxation and rejuvenation can be found in the wellness and beauty centre, complete with spa facilities and a soothing hammam.

Before retiring to their cabins, guests can catch a movie in the open-air cinema or enjoy music and conversations in the piano and bar room.

        View this post on Instagram                       A post shared by Fincantieri Yachts (@fincantieriyachts)

How did the yacht end up in the hands of the Middle Eastern royal family? Prince Salman was on vacation in southern France in early 2016 when he spotted the magnificent luxury yacht on the coast. Not only did the stunning yacht catch his eye, but MBS immediately sent an aide to purchase it from Russian tycoon Yuri Shefler. Within a few hours, the yacht with two helipads, a submarine, and a nightclub became the property of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud. He loves the yacht so much that he adorned one of the most expensive paintings in the world, Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi, purchased for $450 million in 2017 (which is more expensive than the yacht itself).

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Snowroom and more: A look inside Saudi Crown Prince’s USD 400 million superyacht

By Mashable ME

04 July 2023

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud owns a serene superyacht which is reportedly worth dollars 400 million as per The Siasat Daily . 

The saudi crown prince bought the megayacht from the previous owner, russian businessman yuri shefler in 2015., let’s take a look inside the mammoth 439 feet long vessel: , the superyacht can accommodate up to 24 guests in 12 cabins with private decks as well as 52 crew members, including the captain, in 30 cabins., the luxurious yacht facilities include seven swimming pools with an underwater viewing room., one such standout element that makes it a masterpiece is the snow room which can be cooled to 12 degrees fahrenheit and features real snow falling from the ceiling., the 134-meter serene yacht has a health spa, a saltwater pool as well as an outdoor cinema. it also has a nightclub over a combined 48,000 square feet., the lavish vessel also reportedly has a climbing wall, a submarine, and two helipads, and a $450 million da vinci painting., the yacht also has a dedicated children’s playroom, many social spaces for guests, as well as a conference room. .

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Inside Johnny Depp’s Epic Bromance With Saudi Crown Prince MBS

By Bradley Hope

A n ornately clad royal, draped in velvet and frills, sits at his dressing table within the hallowed halls of Versailles awaiting a final dusting of powder. Just then, a courtier bursts in with an urgent message concerning the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

But this is not the 1700s, and the man in the chair is not King Louis XV. It’s July 2022, and Johnny Depp, of Owensboro, Kentucky, is having his hair and makeup done for his role in a French period piece titled Jeanne du Barry. The messenger is a senior producer with a surprising request: Prince Badr bin Farhan Al Saud wants to meet with Depp.

The prince, an amiable fellow with a toothy grin, is Saudi Arabia’s culture minister—and a cousin of the omnipotent Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS. In 2017, Prince Badr made headlines when he served as the front man for MBS’s purchase of the world’s most expensive painting, Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi. Price tag: $450 million.

Not that Depp cares. “No way,” he tells the producer. “I didn’t sign up for this.”

The catch, however, is that Prince Badr has suddenly become very important to the production of Jeanne du Barry. By investing millions in the project via Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Fund, he has earned the right to an audience with the star.

After a few days of back-and-forth, Depp reluctantly agrees to the meeting. It goes so well that, within months, the 60-year-old actor, known for palling around with the likes of Keith Richards and the late Hunter S. Thompson, will stand face-to-face with MBS, the 38-year-old de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia.

Theirs will be a bromance like no other.

W ith his willingness to spend billions of dollars in a relentless drive to transform his country into a cultural and economic superpower, MBS is shaking up the world order. To decipher his increasingly consequential moods, methods, and moves, global leaders rely on thousands of diplomats, linguists, and spies.

They should probably just call Depp.

Over the past year, Depp has spent more than seven weeks in Saudi Arabia, staying in royal palaces and camps, traversing the country by yacht and helicopter, and even flying to London and back on MBS’s personal 747 for a quick trip to attend the Jeff Beck Memorial Concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

In that time, Depp and MBS have become real friends. “They made a genuine connection,” says a friend of Depp’s. “It’s a shock to many of the people who know [Depp], but it’s what happened.” Insiders say Depp is now weighing a seven-figure annual contract to promote Saudi Arabia’s cultural renaissance.

Both men knew how it felt to suddenly go from golden boy to outcast. Depp’s stock had taken a hit after his ex-wife Amber Heard accused him of abuse. In two high-profile court cases, Depp contested those claims, which he has always denied. As Depp and Heard wrangled in court in the second case, a cascade of unflattering personal details hit the press and social media. The ugly spectacle, and the troll war it sparked, damaged Depp’s reputation in some circles.

For MBS, it was the horrific murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the hands of Saudi state operatives in 2018 that sent shudders around the world, irrevocably tainting the crown prince’s carefully cultivated image as a brilliant young reformer.

Reached for comment, Johnny Depp said, “Though I admit I was somewhat naive at first to what was transpiring in the region, I’ve since experienced firsthand the cultural revolution that is happening there—from emerging young storytellers radiating fresh ideas and works of art to a blossoming film infrastructure and a newfound curiosity for innovation. I’ve had the opportunity to meet people from various parts of the region who have been most welcoming in sharing with me their culture, their traditions, and their stories.”

D epp’s introduction to Prince Badr was set in motion by Sina Taleb, a French wheeler-dealer whose famous friends include Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire. During a chance meeting in Cannes, Taleb and Badr got to talking about how to bring more A-list talent to the kingdom to support its burgeoning film industry.

Rather than paying actors to visit, an inherently cynical transaction, Taleb said Saudi Arabia should invest in films to demonstrate its commitment to the arts.

Under MBS’s ambitious Vision 2030 plan, Saudi Arabia is plowing hundreds of billions of dollars into a kaleidoscope of ventures—everything from mining and real estate to sports and tourism. The goal is to develop new revenue streams and kick the kingdom’s addiction to oil money.

Entertainment is a key focus because it not only increases tourism but also persuades more of the country’s 30 million residents to do their leisure spending domestically. Under the draconian rules that MBS started to wipe away in 2015, entertainment was highly constrained: Playing music in public was banned, men and women couldn’t easily mix, and even simple pleasures like going to the movies were unheard of.

Eight years later, the country is booming with cultural activity, some of which reflects the personal interests of its all-powerful crown prince. He’s said to be a big video gamer, and Saudi Arabia has plans to invest $38 billion in esports and gaming. He’s also believed to be an amateur DJ who loves electronic dance music, and the country now hosts the Middle East’s biggest music festival, Soundstorm, every December.

“We’re making up for lost time and making sure that our country realizes its potential,” a Saudi government adviser says of the country’s huge entertainment push.

Back in the early ’60s, Lawrence of Arabia was shot in Jordan, Morocco, and Spain. At the time, filming in the kingdom was all but prohibited. Today, productions are flocking to Saudi Arabia for the scenery, yes, but also for the rebates, which can rise as high as 40 percent of the budget.

“It’s not just a prince saying I want to have Tom Cruise come here,” says producer Jonathan Gray, who first met MBS in France in the early 2000s. “It’s the economy.”

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According to Gray, MBS is a sci-fi aficionado. “It’s really the capacity to escape your mind, thanks to worlds so different from ours, that makes it special for him,” he says.

In 2021, Gray’s company, The Hideaway Entertainment, and Anthony and Joe Russo’s AGBO shot scenes for Cherry, the first major Hollywood production filmed in Saudi Arabia since MBS’s ascension six years earlier. (The 2012 drama -Wadjda was the first feature to be shot entirely in Saudi Arabia.) Starring Tom Holland as an American college dropout who grapples with PTSD after serving as a medic in Iraq, Cherry was distributed by Apple TV+ and debuted to middling reviews.

Gray says he’s now developing Saudi stories for an international audience. One initiative is building a horror franchise around the invisible spirits known in Islam as djinn. His company receives funds for financing and development through a $50 million vehicle called Meridian Entertainment Fund, whose investors include Saudi nationals.

Still, luring the biggest names in Hollywood takes more than cash. Many in the industry are nervous about the reputational risks of associating with Saudi Arabia. Khashoggi’s murder is a major concern, and he’s far from the only critic who has been targeted. Countless others have been arrested and detained. The kingdom also has a dismal human rights record and backward positions on LGBTQ+ rights, freedom of speech, and other issues generally sacred to Western liberals.

Martin Scorsese declined an invitation to attend the Red Sea Film Festival last year, but not everyone is so skittish. The 2023 Features Competition Jury was presided over by Baz Luhrmann, the Australian director of Elvis, The Great Gatsby, and Moulin Rouge!. Others spotted on Jeddah’s red carpet in recent years include Sharon Stone, Priyanka Chopra, and the Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan. ( Vanity Fair Europe has partnered with the Red Sea Film Festival on several events.)

MBS relies on two members of his inner circle, both old friends, to cultivate foreign entertainers and athletes: Prince Badr and Turki Al Sheikh, chairman of the General Entertainment Authority.

A Ministry of Interior official turned “poet” who regales his 18 million Instagram followers with his latest compositions, Al Sheikh, 42, is the life of the party. One of his initiatives is the Riyadh Season, an annual series of concerts and spectacles, including a fountain show worthy of the Las Vegas Strip. Last year’s event featured a boxing match between WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and MMA star Francis Ngannou. A die-hard soccer fan, Al Sheikh has also helped lead the charge to bring such icons as Cristiano Ronaldo and Neymar to Saudi Arabia’s Pro League.

Meanwhile, Prince Badr, born two weeks before MBS, plays the cultural ambassador, attending events like the Venice Biennale and meeting the heads of museums. In the last few years, he has developed a coterie of prominent friends who, in turn, introduce new prospects to Saudi Arabia. Among them is rapper Swizz Beatz, the husband of singer Alicia Keys, who has spent considerable time in the kingdom over the past several years. He shot an episode of his Hulu show, Drive With Swizz Beatz, in the Saudi desert.

Swizz has a long history of advising the ultrarich on art collecting. Before Jho Low, the alleged Malaysian fraudster, went on the run from the Department of Justice and other investigators, Swizz helped persuade him to purchase Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Dustheads for $48.8 million.

Now, Swizz is advising Prince Badr on art acquisitions. If there are plans to display Salvator Mundi, they are closely guarded. Friends have learned not to ask because Badr tends to excuse himself from the room whenever the painting is mentioned.

Badr recently Instagrammed a photo of himself and Saudi Arabia’s vice minister of culture, Hamed Fayez, with basketball legend LeBron James and his business partner Maverick Carter. Swizz wrote in a comment, “My brothers .” Like Depp, James and Carter were introduced to Saudi Arabia by Taleb.

I ntrigued by Taleb’s advice to invest in Hollywood projects as a way of luring A-list talent, Prince Badr asked him to find some films that needed funding.

“These guys mean business,” Taleb says.

So in the summer of 2022, he called an old friend named Thomas Langmann, who had produced The Artist. Taleb says Langmann gave him two ideas: Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis and Jeanne du Barry, starring Johnny Depp.

It turned out that Coppola didn’t need—or want—any additional money, but Jeanne du Barry was struggling to come in under its tight budget.

With Taleb’s help, Prince Badr and the film’s producers arranged for Saudi Arabia to invest millions to cover budget overruns and some additional expenditures. The film’s final budget was $22.4 million.

Everything seemed in order until Prince Badr asked to visit Depp on set. At the time, the royal cousin was staying nearby in one of MBS’s houses. The $300 million château, set on a 57-acre site complete with moats, is called Château Louis XIV.

Depp’s wariness had to do with another Saudi prince he’d spent many years carousing with in New York and Paris and on the Mediterranean coast. Prince Abdulaziz bin Fahd—the fabulously wealthy son of the former King Fahd, MBS’s uncle—famously traveled the world with an entourage of two dozen hedonistic associates. They rented yachts, bought out restaurants, and generally partied nonstop.

There was a dark side to these escapades. In 2012, a member of his retinue was convicted of raping a woman at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan, where the prince had rented out a block of rooms.

Suddenly, in 2017, Prince Abdulaziz stopped appearing in public. It turned out that he was caught up in the so-called sheikdown, wherein MBS suddenly detained close to 300 of Saudi Arabia’s richest men, including his own relatives, on suspicion of corruption. The majority were held at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Riyadh, the same venue that weeks earlier had hosted visiting CEOs and dignitaries for the annual Future Investment Initiative conference.

Many of the detainees were released after giving up a portion of their fortunes, but a few have yet to reemerge publicly. One of them, former Riyadh governor Prince Turki bin Abdullah, had allegedly been plotting against MBS.

Depp’s friend Prince Abdulaziz eventually resurfaced, smiling for a photo beside MBS, but he has kept a very low profile ever since.

Upon hearing Depp’s reasons for not wanting to meet, Prince Badr was able to reassure the actor that his old friend had been released following a temporary detention. He said Depp was welcome to meet with Prince Abdulaziz in Saudi Arabia and even offered to let him look at the official corruption case file at one of the Saudi embassies in Europe.

The openness worked and the two men met. A few months later, Prince Badr’s team persuaded Depp to fly to Jeddah for the 2022 Red Sea Film Festival. Once Depp arrived, however, he skipped the public events. Instead, a team led him on a tour around the country.

It was Depp’s first visit to Saudi Arabia, and he looked around wide-eyed at the changes underway. One person familiar with the trip said Depp bonded with Prince Badr but also talked to a wide range of people—drivers, desert guides, young artists, and members of the royal court.

By the end of the visit, Depp had apparently proved himself worthy of meeting the crown prince himself. They hit it off instantly.

Depp’s friends in London were alarmed when they heard about his budding relationship with MBS.

But the edginess appealed to Depp, who was still recovering from the chaotic aftermath of his divorce from Heard, those friends say. He seemed refreshed by the time away from his hard-drinking friends in Europe and the crowd that surrounds his rock band, the Hollywood Vampires.

“The trips to Saudi are actually healthy for him,” a friend says. Drinking is technically prohibited in Saudi Arabia, but VIP guests are still treated to alcohol in private settings, especially on yachts because, as they see it, they are technically not on Saudi soil.

Moreover, Depp, who did not recognize himself in the tabloid coverage of the Heard trial, was beginning to question the Western narrative about Saudi Arabia. The crown prince said the world had unfairly tarnished him as a bloodthirsty dictator in the vein of Saddam Hussein. This was Saudi Arabia’s greatest moment, he told Depp, a major transformation perceptible even on a monthly basis, if people would only bother to visit.

“He became a believer that this is actually a country in the midst of a cultural revolution,” Taleb says.

One of the key stops on Depp’s tours with MBS and Prince Badr was AlUla, an ancient oasis city that had been off-limits before MBS came along. The authorities never said why the city was closed off, but it probably had something to do with a story in the Quran about how God punished the people of the area, known as Madain Saleh, with an earthquake that made it inhospitable to human life.

There was also concern that Saudi Arabia’s once-powerful religious conservatives would destroy the petroglyphs carved into AlUla’s cliffs by the same pre-Islamic civilization that settled Petra in Jordan.

But under MBS, who has espoused a more liberal and personal form of Islam, AlUla has become the center of a high-end cultural explosion. Each year, its contemporary performing arts center, Maraya, nestled in a canyon and clad completely in mirrors, hosts events for the Winter at Tantora festival.

On his second visit, in early 2023, Depp was invited to MBS’s royal camp in the mountains, with trained falcons, luxury tents, and an outdoor kitchen tended by dozens of staff, all accompanied by sweeping views.

He also flew on multiple occasions by helicopter to MBS’s yacht, Serene, one of the largest in the world. The 439-foot vessel mostly travels around the Red Sea as part of a floating palace complex, with as many as a dozen other smaller boats providing additional space for guests and crew. Depp always brings his guitar, according to a person familiar with the visits.

The yacht is set up to serve as a mobile statehouse. MBS hosted Secretary of State John Kerry there in 2015. But with the touch of a few buttons, it can be turned into a nightclub with state-of-the-art DJ equipment.

MBS and many of his advisers are night owls, staying up all night and sleeping well into the day. It’s a habit that MBS acquired as a teenager, and some, like his younger brother Khalid bin Salman, the defense minister, find it helpful to be on the same schedule as counterparts in the US.

Depp likes to burn the midnight oil too, and he and MBS would stay up late talking about the crown prince’s plans for Saudi Arabia and Depp’s thoughts on how to bring more art and filmmaking to the country. At one point, Depp gave the prince a painting he’d made.

One night, Depp summoned the courage to ask a simple but potentially explosive question: What really happened with Khashoggi?

A veteran journalist with ties to both Saudi intelligence and the Muslim Brotherhood, Khashoggi had been living in Turkey and the US and had become an increasingly vocal critic of MBS’s rule, chastising the crown prince in The Washington Post and elsewhere for the war in Yemen and his aggressive moves to silence critics on both sides of the political spectrum. In October 2018, Khashoggi visited the Saudi consulate in Istanbul to obtain paperwork that would allow him to marry his Turkish fiancée. Once inside, he was drugged, killed, and dismembered by Saudi operatives.

A listening device installed by the Turkish government captured the cold-blooded murder in excruciating detail. Its release shattered the image of MBS internationally and led to a widespread, if unofficial and inconsistent, boycott of all things Saudi for a few years. Joe Biden promised to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” state in the run-up to the 2020 election.

MBS denied ordering the hit but admitted he was ultimately responsible for Khashoggi’s death. Many of those involved in the operation were put on trial, and several were sentenced to prison. For about three years, MBS reduced his travel and focused inwardly on his Vision 2030 plan. Observers speculated that his family would remove him from power and return Saudi Arabia to its traditionally glacial status quo. They were wrong.

By 2022, the furor had subsided enough that MBS felt comfortable answering Depp’s question. With an earnest expression, MBS began laying out his argument that Khashoggi had become a rogue operative working with the country’s enemies to undermine the crown prince’s reform agenda. The West saw Khashoggi as a journalist, MBS said, but the royal court viewed him as a corrupt enemy of the state, putting its future at risk for hidden motives.

MBS said that his staff had been ordered to arrest Khashoggi on criminal charges if the opportunity arose but that the directive had been misunderstood by overeager underlings who believed the prince would be happy if Khashoggi were silenced permanently. Consistent with his public statements, MBS told Depp he didn’t order the murder but nonetheless took responsibility.

The CIA said in a confidential assessment that it believed with high confidence MBS ordered the killing, The Washington Post and The New York Times reported in 2018.

T he bromance is now in full gear, people close to Depp say. And naturally, being close to the crown prince of Saudi Arabia has its benefits.

Depp maintains to anyone he discusses the topic with that he values the friendship for what it is and doesn’t want anything in return.

But to secure Depp’s assistance in putting Saudi Arabia on the cultural map, his team is in talks with the Saudi government about an annual seven-figure deal for him to attend events and shoot films in the country. In December, he attended the Red Sea Film Festival for the regional premiere of Jeanne du Barry.

Earlier in the year, the Red Sea Film Foundation, through its financing arm, announced an investment in Depp’s next directorial effort, Modi, about Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani. As part of the arrangement, Saudi interns have worked on the project across every department.

The plot of the film, which stars Al Pacino and the Italian actor Riccardo Scamarcio in the title role, bears some semblance to Depp’s own recent personal and professional journey. It takes place over two days as Modigliani hits rock bottom, drunkenly alienating those closest to him.

According to a press release from the Red Sea Film Foundation, the “chaos reaches a crescendo when he’s faced with a collector who could change his life.”

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Saudi prince Mohammed bin Salman 'buys £452m yacht' but slashes public spending

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A senior member of Saudi Arabia’s royal family bought a £452 million yacht before helping push through drastic austerity measures within the country.

Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman picked out a Russian tycoon’s 440ft ship while holidaying in the south of France, according to the New York Times .

Prince Mohammed has frozen government contracts and it emerged this month that the country's capital spending was dropping by 71 per cent in 2016.

The article claims Prince Mohammed dispatched an aid to buy Yuri Shefler’s vessel after spotting it floating off the coast.

The deal - reported at €500 million, £452 million by today’s exchange rate - was done within hours, according to an associate of Mr Shefler and a Saudi close to the royal family.

The Russian apparently moved off the yacht the same day.

Part of the reform measures that Prince Mohammed is responsible for includes

cutting ministers pay by 20 per cent .

Joseph Kechichian , a senior fellow at the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh, said: “I am persuaded as someone who focuses on this topic that the ruling family of Saudi Arabia above all else puts the interest of the family first and foremost.”

The Independent has contacted the House of Saud for comment.

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Inside Mohammed bin Salman’s amazing £44million superyacht with cinema room and £330m Leonardo da Vinci painting on wall

• Katie Davis
• Published : 7:10 ET, Oct 7 2021
• Updated : 6:10 ET, Jan 27 2024

SAUDI Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is the proud owner of a £44million superyacht.

The impressive 78m vessel - which comes with a hefty price tag - boasts everything from a 13-seat cinema to a helipad that doubles up as a golf driving range.

There is even the world's most expensive painting on board, an original by Leonardo da Vinci called Salvator Mundi - which is Latin for Saviour of the World

Bin Salman reportedly bought it for around £330million at Christie's in 2017, and it is thought to hang on one of the walls of his yacht.

The yacht, named Pegasus VIII, was seen moored in the bay near Pendennis Point, in the picturesque town of Falmouth back in April.

Bin Salman, often referred to as MBS, is about to become the owner of Newcastle United.

And Toon stars will certainly want a tour of the boat that has accommodation for up to 12 guests and has a crew of 26 people.

There is plenty to keep bin Salman's visitors entertained, as the yacht features a party deck complete with two bars, a dance floor, grand piano and barbecue - not to mention the 1,000 bottle tequila cellar.

The ship - which has a top cruising speed of 16 knots - also has its own gym and jacuzzi on the exterior deck, as well as a drydock which can be flooded to create a 12-metre swimming pool.

The sizeable ship was built by the Royal Denship, a Danish yacht construction company, and delivered in 2003, bought by Californian investor Ronald Tutor.

The yacht's exterior design and engineering are the work of Espen Oeino, the naval architect behind the looks of many world's biggest boats, while Francesco Zuretti put together the interior.

Tutor named it Pegasus V, having previously owned other yachts with the name Pegasus.

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In 2015, the businessman sold it on to the Saudi prince for £44million, who renamed the ship Pegasus VIII.

The 35-year-old, who serves as Saudi Arabia's deputy prime minister, sent the cruiser off to the Netherlands for an intensive refit, according to Super Yacht Fan.

It is powered by diesel-electric engines, and with a 435,700 litre fuel tanks, has a maximum range of 7,5000 nautical miles at 12 knots.

• Foreign royals
• Mohammad Bin Salman
• Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia's ambitious new crown prince is reportedly hiding out on his superyacht, 'fearing for his security'

• Mohammed bin Salman, the 33-year-old crown prince of Saudi Arabia, has been touted as a reformer and embraced by the US.
• But Prince Mohammed's policies at home and abroad have reportedly angered people inside the kingdom.
• Amid what is reported to be growing ire with the crown prince, he is said to be spending more time on his superyacht for security.

Mohammed bin Salman's elevation to crown prince of Saudi Arabia in 2017 set the stage for him to pursue aggressive policies that included confrontations with many rivals around the region.

But changes to the royal line of succession and decisions by the 33-year-old crown prince at home and abroad have undermined the kingdom's longstanding stability and left him in doubt about his own safety, according to Bruce Riedel , the director of the Brookings Institution's Intelligence Project.

Prince Mohammed is reportedly aware of the growing enmity.

"Fearing for his security, the crown prince is said to spend many nights on his half-billion-dollar yacht moored in Jeddah," Riedel wrote for Al-Monitor, where he is a columnist.

Prince Mohammed reportedly dropped a half-billion dollars on the 440-foot-long yacht, named Serene, in late 2016 after spotting it while vacationing in the south of France.

He bought it from a Russian billionaire who moved out the day the deal was signed, and the vessel includes two helipads, an indoor climbing wall, a fully equipped spa, and three swimming pools.

But Prince Mohammed bought it as he helped push severe austerity at home, including major spending cuts and a freeze on government contracts. Such spending is often used to quell dissent.

Related stories

"It's a floating palace longer than a football field and with many perks," Riedel wrote of the yacht. "It is also a potential escape hatch."

'A foolish and dangerous approach'

The main foreign-policy issues that have raised ire toward Prince Mohammed are the now four-year-old war in Yemen — his signature initiative — and the blockade of Qatar.

Criticism of Prince Mohammed's bloody and disastrous war in Yemen, which has subjected many Yemenis to famine and disease, has been brewing inside Saudi Arabia for months, according to Riedel.

A video of Prince Ahmed bin Abdulaziz — the half-brother of King Salman, the father of Prince Mohammed — publicly blaming Prince Mohammed for the war went viral in the kingdom this month.

Saudi Arabia's turn on Qatar reportedly came as a surprise to many US officials, frustrating them even as US President Donald Trump castigated the Qataris. The blockade has been unwelcome within Saudi Arabia — one cleric has been arrested and faces execution for criticizing it — and has split the Gulf Cooperation Council, Riedel wrote .

Prince Mohammed's roundup of powerful business executives and members of the royal family last fall may have been his biggest domestic miscalculation . It spooked investors and led to capital flight, diminishing confidence in Prince Mohammed's ability to manage economic issues.

Among the dozens of businessmen and princes who were arrested was Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, the leader of the Saudi national guard, the kingdom's premier fighting force, which, along with the campaign in Yemen, may further alienate Prince Mohammed from the military.

The removal of Prince Mutaib was seen as likely to stir discontent , and Salman's moves, particularly the roundup, have fed the impression inside the kingdom of Salman "as someone who has disturbed the status quo for the sake of massive personal enrichment and political aggrandizement," according to Rosie Bsheer, a history professor at Yale.

Salman remains the most likely heir as long as his father is alive, but his actions have helped make the kingdom the least stable it has been in 50 years, according to Riedel. Should King Salman, now 81, die in the near future, succession could be disputed, and the process to appoint the next king could turn violent.

"The Trump administration has given Saudi Arabia a blank check and supports its war in Yemen," Riedel wrote . "The crown prince has been touted by the White House. It's a foolish and dangerous approach."

Watch: Why the Saudi crown prince met with Trump, Oprah, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos

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Rise of Saudi Prince Shatters Decades of Royal Tradition

By Mark Mazzetti and Ben Hubbard

• Oct. 15, 2016

He has slashed the state budget, frozen government contracts and reduced the pay of civil employees, all part of drastic austerity measures as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is buffeted by low oil prices.

But last year, Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince, saw a yacht he couldn’t resist.

While vacationing in the south of France, Prince bin Salman spotted a 440-foot yacht floating off the coast. He dispatched an aide to buy the ship, the Serene, which was owned by Yuri Shefler, a Russian vodka tycoon. The deal was done within hours, at a price of approximately 500 million euros (roughly $550 million today), according to an associate of Mr. Shefler and a Saudi close to the royal family. The Russian moved off the yacht the same day.

It is the paradox of the brash, 31-year-old Prince bin Salman: a man who is trying to overturn tradition, reinvent the economy and consolidate power — while holding tight to his royal privilege. In less than two years, he has emerged as the most dynamic royal in the Arab world’s wealthiest nation, setting up a potential rivalry for the throne.

He has a hand in nearly all elements of Saudi policy — from a war in Yemen that has cost the kingdom billions of dollars and led to international criticism over civilian deaths, to a push domestically to restrain Saudi Arabia’s free-spending habits and to break its “addiction” to oil . He has begun to loosen social restrictions that grate on young people .

The rise of Prince bin Salman has shattered decades of tradition in the royal family, where respect for seniority and power-sharing among branches are time-honored traditions. Never before in Saudi history has so much power been wielded by the deputy crown prince, who is second in line to the throne. That centralization of authority has angered many of his relatives.

His seemingly boundless ambitions have led many Saudis and foreign officials to suspect that his ultimate goal is not just to transform the kingdom, but also to shove aside the current crown prince, his 57-year-old cousin, Mohammed bin Nayef, to become the next king. Such a move could further upset his relatives and — if successful — give the country what it has never seen: a young king who could rule the kingdom for many decades.

Crown Prince bin Nayef, the interior minister and longtime counterterrorism czar, has deep ties to Washington and the support of many of the older royals. Deciphering the dynamics of the family can be like trying to navigate a hall of mirrors, but many Saudi and American officials say Prince bin Salman has made moves aimed at reaching into Prince bin Nayef’s portfolios and weakening him.

This has left officials in Washington hedging their bets by building relationships with both men, unsure who will end up on top. The White House got an early sign of the ascent of the young prince in late 2015, when — breaking protocol — Prince bin Salman delivered a soliloquy about the failures of American foreign policy during a meeting between his father, King Salman, and President Obama.

Many young Saudis admire him as an energetic representative of their generation who has addressed some of the country’s problems with uncommon bluntness. The kingdom’s news media have built his image as a hardworking, businesslike leader less concerned than his predecessors with the trappings of royalty.

Others see him as a power-hungry upstart who is risking instability by changing too much, too fast.

Months of interviews with Saudi and American officials, members of the royal family and their associates, and diplomats focused on Saudi affairs reveal a portrait of a prince in a hurry to prove that he can transform Saudi Arabia. Prince bin Salman declined multiple interview requests for this article.

But the question many raise — and cannot yet answer — is whether the energetic leader will succeed in charting a new path for the kingdom, or whether his impulsiveness and inexperience will destabilize the Arab world’s largest economy at a time of turbulence in the Middle East.

Tension at the Top

Early this year, Crown Prince bin Nayef left the kingdom for his family’s villa in Algeria, a sprawling compound an hour’s drive north of Algiers. Although he has long taken annual hunting vacations there, many who know him said that this year was different. He stayed away for weeks, largely incommunicado and often refusing to respond to messages from Saudi officials and close associates in Washington. Even John O. Brennan, the C.I.A. director, whom he has known for decades, had difficulty reaching him.

The crown prince has diabetes, and suffers from the lingering effects of an assassination attempt in 2009 by a jihadist who detonated a bomb he had hidden in his rectum.

But his lengthy absence at a time of low oil prices, turmoil in the Middle East and a foundering Saudi-led war in Yemen led several American officials to conclude that the crown prince was fleeing frictions with his younger cousin and that the prince was worried his chance to ascend the throne was in jeopardy.

Since King Salman ascended to the throne in January 2015 , new powers had been flowing to his son, some of them undermining the authority of the crown prince. King Salman collapsed the crown prince’s court into his own, giving Prince bin Salman control over access to the king. Prince bin Salman also hastily announced the formation of a military alliance of Islamic countries to fight terrorism. Counterterrorism had long been the domain of Prince bin Nayef, but the new plan gave no role to him or his powerful Interior Ministry.

The exact personal relationship between the two men is unclear, fueling discussion in Saudi Arabia and in foreign capitals about who is ascendant. Obscuring the picture are the stark differences in the men’s public profiles. Prince bin Nayef has largely stayed in the shadows, although he did visit New York last month to address the United Nations General Assembly before heading to Turkey for a state visit.

His younger cousin, meanwhile, has worked to remain in the spotlight, touring world capitals, speaking with foreign journalists, being photographed with the Facebook chairman Mark Zuckerberg and presenting himself as a face of a new Saudi Arabia.

“There is no topic that is more important than succession matters, especially now,” said Joseph A. Kechichian, a senior fellow at the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh, who has extensive contacts in the Saudi royal family. “This matters for monarchy, for the regional allies and for the kingdom’s international partners.”

Among the most concrete initiatives so far of Prince bin Salman, who serves as minister of defense, is the Saudi-led war in Yemen , which since it was begun last year has failed to dislodge the Shiite Houthi rebels and their allies from the Yemeni capital. The war has driven much of Yemen toward famine and killed thousands of civilians while costing the Saudi government tens of billions of dollars.

The prosecution of the war by a prince with no military experience has exacerbated tensions between him and his older cousins, according to American officials and members of the royal family. Three of Saudi Arabia’s main security services are run by princes. Although all agreed that the kingdom had to respond when the Houthis seized the Yemeni capital and forced the government into exile, Prince bin Salman took the lead, launching the war in March 2015 without full coordination across the security services.

The head of the National Guard, Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah, had not been informed and was out of the country when the first strikes were carried out, according to a senior National Guard officer.

The National Guard is now holding much of the Yemeni border.

American officials, too, were put off when, just as the Yemen campaign was escalating, Prince bin Salman took a vacation in the Maldives, the island archipelago off the coast of India. Several American officials said Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter had trouble reaching him for days during one part of the trip.

The prolonged war has also heightened tensions between Prince bin Salman and Prince bin Nayef, who won the respect of Saudis and American officials for dismantling Al Qaeda in the kingdom nearly a decade ago and now sees it taking advantage of chaos in Yemen, according to several American officials and analysts.

“If Mohammed bin Nayef wanted to be seen as a big supporter of this war, he’s had a year and a half to do it,” said Bruce Riedel, a former Middle East analyst at the C.I.A. and a fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Near the start of the war, Prince bin Salman was a forceful public advocate for the campaign and was often photographed visiting troops and meeting with military leaders. But as the campaign has stalemated, such appearances have grown rare.

The war underlines the plans of Prince bin Salman for a brawny foreign policy for the kingdom, one less reliant on Western powers like the United States for its security. He has criticized the thawing of America’s relations with Iran and comments by Mr. Obama during an interview this year that Saudi Arabia must “share the neighborhood” with Iran.

This is part of what analysts say is Prince bin Salman’s attempt to foster a sense of Saudi national identity that has not existed since the kingdom’s founding in 1932.

“There has been a surge of Saudi nationalism since the campaign in Yemen began, with the sense that Saudi Arabia is taking independent collective action,” said Andrew Bowen, a Saudi expert at the Wilson Center in Washington.

Still, Mr. Bowen said support among younger Saudis could diminish the longer the conflict dragged on. Diplomats say the death toll for Saudi troops is higher than the government has publicly acknowledged, and a recent deadly airstrike on a funeral in the Yemeni capital has renewed calls by human rights groups and some American lawmakers to block or delay weapons sales to the kingdom.

People who have met Prince bin Salman said he insisted that Saudi Arabia must be more assertive in shaping events in the Middle East and confronting Iran’s influence in the region — whether in Yemen, Syria, Iraq or Lebanon.

Brian Katulis, a Middle East expert at the Center for American Progress in Washington, who met the prince this year in Riyadh, said his agenda was clear.

“His main message is that Saudi Arabia is a force to be reckoned with,” Mr. Katulis said.

A Swift Ascent

Saudi Arabia is one of the world’s few remaining absolute monarchies, which means that Prince bin Salman was given all of his powers by a vote of one: his own father.

The prince’s rise began in early 2015, after King Abdullah died of lung cancer and King Salman ascended to the throne. In a series of royal decrees, the new king restructured the government and shook up the order of succession in the royal family in ways that invested tremendous power in his son.

He was named defense minister and head of a powerful new council to oversee the Saudi economy as well as put in charge of the governing body of Saudi Aramco, the state oil company and the primary engine of the Saudi economy.

More important, the king decreed a new order of succession, overturning the wishes of King Abdullah and replacing his designated crown prince, Muqrin bin Abdulaziz, with Prince bin Nayef.

While all previous Saudi kings and crown princes had been sons of the kingdom’s founder, Prince bin Nayef was the first of the founder’s grandsons to be put in line. Many hailed the move because of the prince’s success at fighting Al Qaeda and because he has only daughters, leading many to hope he would choose a successor based on merit rather than paternity.

The bigger surprise was that the king named Prince bin Salman deputy crown prince. He was 29 years old at the time and virtually unknown to the kingdom’s closest allies.

This effectively scrapped the political aspirations of his older relatives, many of whom had decades of experience in public life and in key sectors like defense and oil policy. Some are still angry — although only in private, out of deference to the 80-year-old king.

Since then, Prince bin Salman has moved quickly to build his public profile and market himself to other nations as the point man for the kingdom.

Domestically, his focus has been on an ambitious plan for the future of the kingdom, called Vision 2030 . The plan, released in April, seeks to transform Saudi life by diversifying its economy away from oil , increasing Saudi employment and improving education, health and other government services. A National Transformation Plan, laying out targets for improving government ministries, came shortly after.

Read in one way, the documents are an ambitious blueprint to change the Saudi way of life. Read in another, they are a scathing indictment of how poorly the kingdom has been run by Prince bin Salman’s elders.

Official government development plans going back decades have called for reducing the dependence on oil and increasing Saudi employment — to little effect. And in calling for transparency and accountability, the plan acknowledges that both have been in short supply. Diplomats and economists say much about the Saudi economy remains opaque, including the cost of generous perks and stipends for members of the royal family.

The need for change is greater now, with global oil prices less than half of what they were in 2014 and hundreds of thousands of young Saudis entering the job market yearly. Prince bin Salman has called for a new era of fiscal responsibility, and over the last year, fuel, water and electricity prices have gone up while the take-home pay of some public sector employees has been cut — squeezing the budgets of average Saudis. He has also said the government will sell shares of Saudi Aramco, believed to be the world’s most valuable company.

Many Saudis say his age and ambition are benefits at a time when old ways of thinking must be changed.

“He is speaking in the language of the youth,” said Hoda al-Helaissi, a member of the kingdom’s advisory Shura Council, which is appointed by the king. “The country for too long has been looking through the lenses of the older generation, and we need to look at who is going to carry the torch to the next generation.”

Some of his initiatives have appeared ham-handed. In December, he held his first news conference to announce the formation of a military alliance of Islamic countries to fight terrorism. But a number of countries that he said were involved soon responded that they knew nothing about it or were still waiting for information before deciding whether to join.

Others have been popular. After Prince bin Salman called for more entertainment options for families and young people, who often flee the country on their vacations, the cabinet passed regulations restricting the powers of the religious police. An Entertainment Authority he established has planned its first activities, which include comedy shows, pro wrestling events and monster truck rallies.

The prince has kept his distance from the Council of Senior Scholars, the mostly elderly clerics who set official religious policy and often release religious opinions that young Saudis mock as being out of touch with modern life.

Instead, he has sought the favor of younger clerics who boast millions of followers on social media. After the release of Vision 2030, Prince bin Salman held a reception for Saudi journalists and academics that included a number of younger, tech-savvy clerics who have gone forth to praise the plan.

Prince bin Salman’s prominence today was difficult to predict during his early years, spent largely below the radar of Western officials who keep track of young Saudi royals who might one day rule the kingdom.

Several of King Salman’s other sons, who studied overseas to perfect foreign languages and earn advanced degrees, built impressive résumés. One became the first Arab astronaut, another a deputy oil minister, yet another the governor of Medina Province.

Prince bin Salman stayed in Saudi Arabia and does not speak fluent English, although he appears to understand it. After a private school education, he studied law at King Saud University in Riyadh, reportedly graduating fourth in his class. Another prince of the same generation said he had gotten to know him during high school, when one of their uncles hosted regular dinners for the younger princes at his palace. He recalled Prince bin Salman being one of the crowd, saying he liked to play bridge and admired Margaret Thatcher.

King Salman is said to see himself in his favorite son, the latest in the lineage of a family that has ruled most of the Arabian Peninsula for eight decades.

In 2007, when the United States ambassador dropped in on King Salman, then a prince and the governor of Riyadh Province, to say farewell at the end of his posting, the governor asked for help circumventing America’s stringent visa procedures. His wife could not get a visa to see her doctor, and although his other children were willing to submit to the visa hurdles, “his son, Prince Mohammed, refused to go to the U.S. Embassy to be fingerprinted ‘like some criminal,’” according to a State Department cable at the time.

Prince bin Salman graduated from the university that year and continued to work for his father, who was named defense minister in 2011, while dabbling in real estate and business.

Many members of the royal family remain wary of the young prince’s projects and ultimate ambitions. Some mock him as the “Prince of the Vision” and complain about his army of well-paid foreign consultants and image-makers.

Other are annoyed by the media cell he created inside the royal court to promote his initiatives, both foreign and domestic. Called the Center for Studies and Media Affairs, the group has focused on promoting a positive story about the Yemen war in Washington and has hired numerous Washington lobbying and public affairs firms to assist in the effort.

Inside the kingdom, the government has largely succeeded in keeping criticism — and even open discussion — of the prince and his projects out of the public sphere. His family holds sway over the parent company of many Saudi newspapers, which have breathlessly covered his initiatives, and prominent Saudi editors and journalists who have accompanied him on foreign trips have been given up to $100,000 in cash, according to two people who have traveled with the prince’s delegation.

Meanwhile, Saudi journalists deemed too critical have been quietly silenced through phone calls informing them that they are barred from publishing, and sometimes from traveling abroad.

In June, a Saudi journalist, Sultan al-Saad al-Qahtani, published an article in Arabic on his website, The Riyadh Post, in which he addressed the lack of discussion about Prince bin Salman’s rise.

“You can buy tens of newspapers and hundreds of journalists, but you can’t buy the history that will be written about you,” he wrote.

He said that the prince’s popularity among Saudis was based on a “sweeping desire for great change” and that they loved him based on the hope that he would “turn their dreams into reality.”

In that lay the risk, Mr. Qahtani wrote: “If you fail, this love withers quickly, as if it never existed, and is replaced by a deep feeling of frustration and hatred.”

The site was blocked the next day, Mr. Qahtani said, for the third time in 13 months. (It is now back up, at a new address .)

As sweeping and long-term as Prince bin Salman’s initiatives are, they may hang by the tenuous thread of his link to his father, who has memory lapses, according to foreign officials who have met with him. Even the prince’s supporters acknowledge that they are not sure he will retain his current roles after his father dies.

In the meantime, he is racing against time to establish his reputation and cement his place in the kingdom’s power structure.

His fast ascent, and his well-publicized foreign trips to Washington, Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere in Asia, have led senior Obama administration officials to consider the prospect that he could step over Prince bin Nayef and become Saudi Arabia’s next king.

This has led to a balancing act for American officials who want to build a relationship with him while not being used as leverage in any rivalry with Prince bin Nayef. Obama administration officials say relations with Prince bin Salman have generally improved, but only after a rocky start when he would routinely lecture senior Americans — even the president.

In November, during a Group of 20 summit meeting at a luxury resort on the Turkish coast, Prince bin Salman gave what American officials described as a lengthy speech about what he saw as the failure of American foreign policy in the Middle East — from the Obama administration’s restraint in Syria to its efforts to improve relations with Iran, Saudi Arabia’s bitter enemy.

Personal relationships have long been the bedrock of American-Saudi relations, yet the Obama administration has struggled to find someone to develop a rapport with the prince. The job has largely fallen to Secretary of State John Kerry, who has hosted the prince several times at his home in Georgetown. In June, the two men shared an iftar dinner, breaking the Ramadan fast. In September 2015, dinner at Mr. Kerry’s house ended with Prince bin Salman playing Beethoven on the piano for the secretary of state and the other guests.

In May, the prince invited Mr. Kerry for a meeting on the Serene , the luxury yacht he bought from the Russian billionaire.

His desire to reimagine the Saudi state is reflected in his admiration — some even call it envy — for the kingdom’s more modern and progressive neighbor in the Persian Gulf, the United Arab Emirates.

He has influential supporters in this effort, particularly the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who for more than a year has been promoting Prince bin Salman in the Middle East and in Washington.

Crown Prince bin Zayed, the United Arab Emirates’ de facto ruler, is a favorite among Obama administration officials, who view him as a reliable ally and a respected voice in the Sunni world. But he also has a history of personal antipathy toward Prince bin Nayef, adding a particular urgency to his support for the chief rival of the Saudi crown prince.

In April of last year, Mr. Obama’s national security adviser, Susan E. Rice, led a small delegation of top White House officials to visit Prince bin Zayed at his home in McLean, Va. During the meeting, according to several officials who attended, the prince urged the Americans to develop a relationship with Prince bin Salman.

But all questions about Prince bin Salman’s future are likely to depend on how long his father lives, according to diplomats who track Saudi Arabia.

If he died soon, Prince bin Nayef would become king and could dismiss his younger cousin as a gesture to his fellow royals. In fact, it was King Salman who set the precedent for such moves by dismissing the crown prince named by his predecessor.

“If the king’s health starts to deteriorate, Mohammed bin Salman is very likely to try to get Mohammed bin Nayef out of the picture,” said Mr. Riedel, the former C.I.A. analyst.

But the longer King Salman reigns, foreign officials said, the longer the young prince has to consolidate his power — or to convince Prince bin Nayef that he is worth keeping around if Prince bin Nayef becomes king.

Most Saudi watchers do not expect any struggles within the family to spill into the open, as all the royals understand how much they have to lose from such fissures becoming public or destabilizing their grip on the kingdom.

“I am persuaded as someone who focuses on this topic that the ruling family of Saudi Arabia above all else puts the interest of the family first and foremost,” said Mr. Kechichian, the analyst who knows many royals.

“Not a single member of the family will do anything to hurt the family.”

An article on Oct. 16 about Prince Mohammed bin Salman, son of King Salman of Saudi Arabia and a potential rival with his cousin for the throne, misstated, in some editions, an achievement of another one of King Salman’s sons. The son, Sultan bin Salman, was the first Arab astronaut, not the only one.

How we handle corrections

Nicholas Kulish, Jo Becker and Matt Apuzzo contributed reporting.

SMART NEWS ARTS & CULTURE

Saudi prince revealed as buyer of $450 million da vinci heading to the louvre abu dhabi.

An investigation by David D. Kirkpatrick of the New York Times revealed the buyer’s identity

Brigit Katz

Correspondent

Last month, a 500-year-old painting believed to be the work of Leonardo da Vinci was purchased for an astonishing $450 million at a Christie’s auction in New York, making it the most expensive artwork ever sold. Christie’s did not disclose the identity of the anonymous bidder who snagged the painting, but an investigation by David D. Kirkpatrick of the New York Times has revealed that the mysterious buyer is a Saudi Prince.

Bader bin Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Farhan al-Saud is a “little-known Saudi prince from a remote branch of the royal family,” Kirkpatrick writes. He is not an established art collector and, according to documents reviewed by the Times , Christie’s officials had to scramble to confirm Prince Bader’s identity when he entered into the auction one day before the sale was scheduled to take place.

Shortly before the Times published its report, the recently launched Louvre Abu Dhabi announced that it would be acquiring “Salvator Mundi,” as the da Vinci painting is titled. This in turn led to speculation that the buyer was closely linked to the Middle East, according to Alex Greenberger of ArtNews . As it turns out, Prince Bader is a friend of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. And Prince Mohammed is closely allied with United Arab Emirates and its rulers in Abu Dhabi, reports Kareem Shaheen of the Guardian .

With his ties to the ruling branch of the royal family, Prince Bader has been able to secure a number of high-ranking positions, according to Kirkpatrick of the Times. Prince Mohammed and his father, King Salman, appointed Prince Bader to the chairmanship of the Saudi Research and Marketing Group, which publishes the Saudi-owned daily Asharq al-Awsat . In July, Prince Bader was named governor of a commission to develop the province of Al-Ola, which is home to an important Nabataean-era archaeological site, into a tourist destination. Prince Mohammed heads that commission.

Prince Bader’s extravagant acquisition of "Salvator Mundi" is eyebrow raising, given that Saudi Arabia is in the midst of a comprehensive anti-corruption crackdown that has targeted prominent members of the kingdom’s elite circles.

The initiative is being spearheaded by Prince Mohammed, who reportedly seeks to recover up to $100 billion that has been skimmed off public funds over the course of several decades. Dozens of business leaders, officials and princes were detained last month at a five-star hotel in the capital city of Riyadh.

But critics have accused Prince Mohammed of using the crackdown as a means to consolidate his power.  The climate in Saudi Arabia certainly does not appear to have deterred Prince Bader from shelling out an enormous sum for " Salvator Mundi " (which, despite all the hype, has been dogged by questions about its authenticity). “The $450.3 million purchase is the clearest indication yet of the selective nature of the crackdown,” Kirkpatrick writes.

Prince Bader will reportedly pay for "Salvator Mundi" in six installments of more than $58 million.

In a statement published in the Asharq al-Awsat , Prince Bader called the Times report “imprecise” and accused the publication of being “opposed to anything Saudi and frequently [publishing] strange rumors,” according to the Guardian ’s Shaheen. Prince Bader did not, however, deny purchasing the artwork.

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Brigit Katz | | READ MORE

Brigit Katz is a freelance writer based in Toronto. Her work has appeared in a number of publications, including NYmag.com, Flavorwire and Tina Brown Media's Women in the World.

End of the Line? Saudi Arabia ‘forced to scale back’ plans for desert megacity

Crown prince’s pet project was sold as a 105-mile-long city of the future, but finances may have led to a rethink

It was billed as a glass-walled city of the future, an ambitious centrepiece of the economic plan backed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to transition Saudi Arabia away from oil dependency.

Now, however, plans for the mirror-clad desert metropolis called the Line have been scaled down and the project, which was envisaged to stretch 105 miles (170km) is expected to reach just a mile and a half by 2030.

Dreamed up as a linear city that would eventually be home to about 9 million people on a footprint of just 13 sq miles, the Line is part of a wider Neom project. Now at least one contractor has begun dismissing workers.

The scaling down of Prince Mohammed’s most grandiose project was reported by Bloomberg , which said it had seen documents relating to the project.

The project, which had been slated to cost $1.5tn (£1.2tn), was pitched as a reinvention of urban design. However, it has long attracted scepticism and criticism, not least after the reported execution of several members of the Howeitat tribe who had protested over plans to construct on their ancestral lands.

Then there were reports of Prince Mohammed’s changing vision for the project, budget overspends and an ever-changing roster of key staff, with some who have worked on the project describing it as “untethered from reality”.

According to Bloomberg, the scaling back of the Line comes as the overall Neom budget for 2024 has yet to be approved by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund amid declining cash reserves.

Promotional presentations had suggested something out of a science fiction novel running inland into Tabuk province from the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba where it enters the Red Sea.

A few hundred metres wide, the linear city had been sold as the future of accessible urban planning, with amenities for residents within close walking distance to accommodation and districts connected by one of the world’s fastest trains.

Promotional material described the Line in almost mystical terms: a “cognitive city” and a “civilisation revolution” where amenities would be provided by artificial intelligence.

Prince Mohammed, who has long been accused of involvement in the killing of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul in 2018, had described the city project as “tackling the challenges facing humanity in urban life today” to “shine a light on alternative ways to live”.

Not everyone, however, has been convinced by the prince’s glossy prospectus. Writing in the New York Times in 2021 at the time Neom released a video describing the prospects of living between the city’s silvered walls, the US journalist and author Robert Worth said: “To watch the crown prince’s promotional video is to be immersed in a distinctively Saudi form of arrogance, blending religious triumphalism and royal grandiosity.”

And hubris, too, apparently.

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Inside Mohammed bin Salman’s amazing £44million superyacht with cinema room and £330m Leonardo da Vinci painting on wall

• Katie Davis
• Published : 12:10, 7 Oct 2021
• Updated : 11:10, 27 Jan 2024

SAUDI Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is the proud owner of a £44million superyacht.

The impressive 78m vessel - which comes with a hefty price tag - boasts everything from a 13-seat cinema to a helipad that doubles up as a golf driving range.

There is even the world's most expensive painting on board, an original by Leonardo da Vinci called Salvator Mundi - which is Latin for Saviour of the World

Bin Salman reportedly bought it for around £330million at Christie's in 2017, and it is thought to hang on one of the walls of his yacht.

The yacht, named Pegasus VIII, was seen moored in the bay near Pendennis Point, in the picturesque town of Falmouth back in April.

Bin Salman, often referred to as MBS, is about to become the owner of Newcastle United.

And Toon stars will certainly want a tour of the boat that has accommodation for up to 12 guests and has a crew of 26 people.

There is plenty to keep bin Salman's visitors entertained, as the yacht features a party deck complete with two bars, a dance floor, grand piano and barbecue - not to mention the 1,000 bottle tequila cellar.

The ship - which has a top cruising speed of 16 knots - also has its own gym and jacuzzi on the exterior deck, as well as a drydock which can be flooded to create a 12-metre swimming pool.

The sizeable ship was built by the Royal Denship, a Danish yacht construction company, and delivered in 2003, bought by Californian investor Ronald Tutor.

The yacht's exterior design and engineering are the work of Espen Oeino, the naval architect behind the looks of many world's biggest boats, while Francesco Zuretti put together the interior.

Tutor named it Pegasus V, having previously owned other yachts with the name Pegasus.

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In 2015, the businessman sold it on to the Saudi prince for £44million, who renamed the ship Pegasus VIII.

The 35-year-old, who serves as Saudi Arabia's deputy prime minister, sent the cruiser off to the Netherlands for an intensive refit, according to Super Yacht Fan.

It is powered by diesel-electric engines, and with a 435,700 litre fuel tanks, has a maximum range of 7,5000 nautical miles at 12 knots.

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President receives condolences from Saudi Crown Prince over Sheikh Tahnoon's death

President Sheikh Mohamed received a telephone call from Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Monday.

Prince Mohammed offered his condolences and sympathy over the death of Sheikh Tahnoon bin Mohammed , Ruler’s Representative of Al Ain Region, state news agency Wam reports.

He also passed on his best wishes to the family of Sheikh Tahnoon, who died last week at the age of 82.

Sheikh Mohamed expressed his gratitude for the sentiments and also offered his condolences over the death of renowned Saudi poet Prince Badr bin Abdul Mohsen, who died on Saturday.

Sheikh Tahnoon was a close adviser to the UAE Founding Father, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan , and was an uncle of the head of state.

He was previously deputy chairman of the Executive Council of Abu Dhabi, chairman of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company and deputy chairman of the Supreme Petroleum Council.

The road from Al Ain to Dubai was named in his honour in November 2018, after major renovation work improved the city's connection to Dubai and Sharjah.

In tribute last week, Sheikh Mohamed wrote on X: “May God grant eternal rest to my uncle, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Mohammed, who was a close companion of the late Sheikh Zayed and dedicated his life in loyal service to our nation and its people, continuing the vision of our Founding Father.

“We pray that God bestows His mercy on Sheikh Tahnoon and blesses us with patience and solace at this time.”

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Saudi arabia’s crown prince to visit japan later this month.

(Bloomberg) -- Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman will travel to Japan later this month on a rare trip outside of the Middle East.

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The kingdom’s de facto ruler will meet Prime Minister Fumio Kishida during a trip from May 20 to May 23, the Japanese government said on Friday.

The two countries have deep economic ties. Saudi Arabia was Japan’s eighth-biggest trading partner last year, according to the International Monetary Fund, with flows totaling $42 billion.

Japan is one of the biggest buyers of crude oil from Saudi Arabia, and the kingdom’s wealth fund is among the largest shareholders in gaming giant Nintendo Co.

The countries also have a “Saudi-Japan Vision 2030” agreement that’s meant to see Japanese companies invest in industries such as agriculture, medical care, energy and infrastructure in the kingdom.

The wider Vision 2030 is Prince Mohammed’s plan to transform the Saudi economy by investing hundreds of billions of dollars in everything from tourism to electric vehicles and semiconductors.

MBS, as the Saudi crown prince is known, was meant to visit Japan in late 2022, but the trip was canceled shortly before he was scheduled to arrive.

--With assistance from Rakteem Katakey and Adveith Nair.

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Royal bounty: Who would want to kill the Saudi Crown Prince, and why?

By   Murad Sadygzade , President of the Middle East Studies Center, Visiting Lecturer, HSE University (Moscow).

Recently, several media outlets reported an attack on the convoy of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS). However, these claims appear to have been false.

The video and information about burning cars in Riyadh emerged in a post by X (formerly Twitter) user Winter Intel, whose account analysis indicates an unreliable source. Later, the General Directorate of Civil Defense of Saudi Arabia reported an accident involving two cars, one of which had caught fire. The agency confirmed that there were no casualties.

Many Saudi journalists also debunked the news of the attack, calling it fake. Despite the widespread presence of fake news in the modern information space, questions remain about who could have an interest in spreading such rumors, and why. Could there indeed be an assassination attempt on MBS, and what might the reasons be?

Vision 2030: A great reformer for a nation of the future

Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, initiated comprehensive reforms in the kingdom from the moment he assumed key positions of power. His ambitious reform program “Vision 2030” reflects a strategic plan to transform various aspects of the country’s economy, society, and culture. The primary economic goal is to reduce Saudi Arabia’s dependence on oil, and MBS has taken several critical steps toward this objective.

Sectors like tourism, entertainment, information technology, healthcare, industry, and mining are being developed. Saudi Arabia aims to increase the share of the non-oil sector in GDP from 16% to 50%. Privatization of state-owned enterprises is another vital element. The process of partial privatization of Saudi Aramco, the state oil company, has begun, as well as privatization of other public enterprises in various sectors.

At the same time, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), one of the largest sovereign funds in the world, with assets exceeding $620 billion, was established. The fund finances many strategic investments within and beyond the country, including the major project to build the futuristic NEOM megacity on the Red Sea coast. To stimulate the private sector, MBS has paid particular attention to developing small and medium-sized businesses, creating favorable conditions for entrepreneurship and foreign investment, including lifting restrictions on foreign ownership of businesses in the country.

MBS has also brought significant changes to Saudi Arabian social life. The most critical step was expanding women’s rights: they can now drive, attend sports stadiums, start their own businesses, and travel without a male guardian’s permission. Mandatory gender segregation at public events has also been abolished. Additionally, the establishment of the General Entertainment Authority has led to the emergence of concerts, cinemas, festivals, and other forms of entertainment previously strictly prohibited.

Opening Saudi Arabia to foreign tourists is another key social reform. Thanks to the introduction of tourist visas, the country has for the first time become accessible to visitors not involved in a pilgrimage. In the cultural sphere, MBS is promoting development of arts and culture. The General Culture Authority was created, launching initiatives to support local artists and cultural projects. Special attention is also given to preserving Saudi Arabia’s cultural heritage, restoring historical sites and opening them to visitors.

Political reforms have also become an essential part of “Vision 2030.” In November 2017, MBS launched an anti-corruption campaign, arresting dozens of princes and businessmen. This campaign allowed significant sums to be returned to the state treasury, which were then used to finance key reforms. The government service reform introduced new standards for civil servants and improved the efficiency of the government apparatus.

Despite the complexity and scale of the changes, MBS continues to advance Vision 2030, striving to make Saudi Arabia more progressive, modern, and sustainable in the future.

“Challenges of 2030”: What problems does MBS face?

MBS’ reforms are already changing the face of Saudi Arabia, but they have sparked strong reactions, both domestically and internationally. Vision 2030 is an ambitious plan to transform Saudi Arabia but the implementation of the program faces significant challenges.

Despite notable achievements, MBS’ reforms have drawn criticism from both inside the country and abroad. The anti-corruption campaign was accompanied by harsh repression of dissent. The November 2017 move on princes and businessmen returned significant sums to the state. However, this step by MBS was also seen as an attempt to eliminate political opponents, consolidate his power, and suppress dissent.

The arrests of activists and journalists have restricted freedom of speech and political participation, provoking strong criticism from international human-rights organizations. The murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018 cemented a negative image of MBS in the eyes of the global community. This crime became a symbol of a brutal suppression of opposition, and several Western countries imposed sanctions on Saudi officials suspected of involvement in the killing.

The UN and international human rights organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have raised concerns and leveled criticism at MBS for the arrests of journalists, bloggers and activists, including female activists fighting for women’s rights such as Loujain al-Hathloul. Strict laws on insulting religion and the state, mistreatment of prisoners, and the kingdom’s use of the death penalty continue to attract global attention.

Another source of international criticism is the war in Yemen. Saudi Arabia, led by MBS, headed a coalition against the Houthis in 2015. The conflict has led to massive civilian casualties and a humanitarian crisis in Yemen. MBS was accused of waging a war that disproportionately targeted civilian infrastructure, and of blockading Yemen, which led to widespread famine.

Sharp economic and social changes have also triggered resistance within Saudi Arabia. Despite efforts to develop non-oil sectors, oil remains a significant source of the country’s revenue. The recent sharp decline in global oil prices has exposed the vulnerability of the kingdom’s economy. Vision 2030 aims to reduce Saudi Arabia’s dependence on oil revenue, but economic diversification has proven to be a challenging task.

The reforms have faced the most resistance from religious and conservative circles. Most significantly, expanding women’s rights was met with fierce criticism from the religious establishment and conservative parts of the population, who see such reforms as a threat to traditional Islamic values.

These problems are not without historical parallels to the reforms of King Faisal, who also faced challenges in modernizing Saudi Arabia in the mid-20th century. King Faisal, the uncle of MBS, also carried out reforms that changed Saudi Arabia. He sought to reduce the country’s dependence on oil by developing infrastructure and non-oil sectors of the economy. In the 1960s and 1970s, he introduced a mandatory education system for girls despite conservative opposition, and sought a more modern, open Saudi Arabia. However, he was shot and killed by his nephew, although the real reasons behind this act remain unclear.

However, there are significant differences between the reforms of MBS and King Faisal. King Faisal acted cautiously and gradually, avoiding abrupt changes, while MBS aims for rapid results, often causing social upheaval. King Faisal was more diplomatic in his approach to opponents, whereas MBS employs harsh methods to suppress adversaries of reform. The anti-corruption campaign and its mass arrests have become part of MBS’ strategy to consolidate power, which critics see as authoritarian.

Rising external tensions

The United States remains Saudi Arabia’s primary strategic partner, but relations between the two countries have often been strained due to MBS’ policies. After the Khashoggi murder, the US Congress and the Biden administration sharply criticized the crown prince. The CIA linked this crime directly to MBS, which led to sanctions against several Saudi officials and complicated relations with Washington. The US also expressed concern over the war in Yemen. President Biden announced the end of US support for the Saudi campaign and reviewed arms supplies. An additional source of tension was the October 2022 OPEC+ decision led by Saudi Arabia to cut oil production, which raised energy prices and angered the Biden administration.

Saudi Arabia and Iran have traditionally been regional rivals, supporting opposing sides in conflicts in Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon while also competing for influence in the Persian Gulf. The severing of their diplomatic relations in 2016 and mutual accusations of destabilizing the region heightened enmity between Riyadh and Tehran. Saudi Arabia criticizes Iran’s nuclear program and supports sanctions against Tehran, fearing the possible development of Iranian nuclear weapons. However, in March 2023, with China’s help, the two nations agreed to restore diplomatic relations, opening a new chapter in the Riyadh-Tehran dialogue and promising a potential reduction in regional tensions, though the fundamental causes of competition and rivalry remain.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has traditionally been a close partner of Saudi Arabia in the region, but the ambitions of its leader, Mohammed bin Zayed (MBZ), create friction. The UAE seeks to become a regional economic hub, which creates competition between Dubai and Riyadh. Saudi Arabia requires international companies to move their headquarters to Riyadh to secure contracts in the kingdom, which displeases Dubai. In Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the UAE fight the Houthis together but pursue different goals: the UAE supports the Southern Transitional Council (STC), which seeks southern Yemen’s independence, while Saudi Arabia advocates a unified Yemen. In relations with Israel, the UAE normalized ties through the Abraham Accords in 2020, promoting regional cooperation, while Saudi Arabia remains hesitant to follow suit due to concerns over internal backlash.

Saudi Arabia and Israel do not have official diplomatic relations, but against the backdrop of common opposition to Iran, both states are cautiously moving towards rapprochement. Tehran remains the main adversary for both countries, providing a basis for informal security cooperation. Israel offers Saudi Arabia support in countering the Iranian threat. In the framework of the Abraham Accords, several Arab countries have normalized relations with Israel. Saudi Arabia has yet to grant official recognition, but negotiations were actively ongoing until the conflict in Gaza erupted in October 2023

Relations between Saudi Arabia and Türkiye improved after a period of tension over the Khashoggi murder. Türkiye seeks to strengthen its influence in the Middle East, competing with Saudi Arabia. Earlier, Ankara had strongly criticized Riyadh’s actions in Yemen and its blockade of Qatar. In 2022, MBS visited Turkey, and the two countries agreed to improve relations. This demonstrates MBS’s pragmatic approach to cooperation, even with those who have criticized him in the past.

In June 2017, Saudi Arabia, led by the UAE, Egypt, and Bahrain, imposed a blockade on Qatar, accusing it of supporting terrorism and of maintaining close ties with Iran. This created deep regional divisions and strengthened Türkiye’s and Iran’s influence over Qatar. However, in January 2021, Riyadh and Doha signed an agreement to restore relations and ended the blockade. Nevertheless, mutual distrust remains.

In the changing global world, Saudi Arabia faces difficulties as MBS seeks to pursue a sovereign and diversified foreign policy. Western criticism often stems not only from human-rights issues and the crown prince’s harsh governance methods but also from his desire to develop relations with Russia and China. Riyadh sees China as a strategic partner in trade and investment. Saudi Arabia and Russia cooperate within OPEC+ on oil-price regulation. Riyadh maintains contacts with Moscow despite Western isolation of Russia due to the war in Ukraine.

MBS’ domestic and foreign policies, despite complicated relations with many countries and forces, reflects his desire to strengthen Saudi Arabia’s position as a regional leader and to reshape the kingdom. However, his harsh methods and uncompromising struggle against the opposition have intensified criticism from global and regional players, creating new challenges for the crown prince. Therefore, potential assassination attempts on the de-facto leader of modern Saudi Arabia may not be fake in the future.

His reforms are opening a new chapter in Saudi Arabian history, but they also highlight the difficulty of modernizing the kingdom amidst contradictions and resistance from various segments of society. The Vision 2030 program remains an ambitious attempt to make the kingdom more progressive, modern, and sustainable in the future, despite the many challenges on this path. After all, not everyone is interested in a strong and sovereign Saudi Arabia.

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