With Saudis to freeze cooperation key Senate chair urges US

For freezing all U.S. cooperation with Saudi Arabia, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez called on Monday, over Saudi oil-production cuts that serve to boost Russia in its war in Ukraine yet of U.S. anger delivering one of the strongest expressions.

In a statement, U.S. strategic partnership with the oil kingdom beyond the minimum necessary to defend Americans and American interests Menendez specifically called for cutting off all arms sales and security cooperation one of the underpinnings of the more than 70-year.

“In Ukraine will not green-light any cooperation with Riyadh enough is enough until the Kingdom reassesses its position with respect to the war”, As committee chairman, Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, vowed. 

In announcing a 2 million barrel a day cut in oil production after Saudi Arabia and Russia led OPEC nations his statement came four days later. To keep paying for his eight-month invasion of Ukraine the Saudi- and Russian-led cuts help prop up high oil prices that are allowing President Vladimir Putin. 

To make the war financially unsustainable for Russia the production cut also hurts the U.S.-led efforts by the Ukraine conflict threatens a global economy already destabilized, and risks saddling President Joe Biden and Democrats with rising gasoline prices just ahead of U.S. midterms.

OPEC nations and Russia since the announcement, have called for stopping what are billions of dollars in annual U.S. arms sales to Saudi Arabia, Menendez’s announcement Monday places him among a growing number of Democrats.

Saudi Arabia in turn providing world markets with a reliable flow of oil, the Democrats accuse Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s de facto ruler, of effectively flouting the Saudi side of a decades-long bargain that has consisted of the U.S. military and defence industry providing security for Saudi Arabia.

Among the Democrats blasting Prince Mohammed for seeming last week Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to act in support of Putin’s invasion.

To deal with what he called Saudi Arabia’s “appalling and deeply cynical action”, Schumer declared then that lawmakers were looking at legislative options.

To stop U.S. arms sales to the kingdom Democratic lawmakers within a day of the OPEC move were introducing new legislation. Menendez’s action Monday,  raises the prospect that Congress could act to punish the Saudis during the lame-duck period after the November elections, given his key role shepherding foreign policy legislation.

It’s not clear how far Menendez and other Democrats would go in practical terms in cutting off weapons deals and most other cooperation with the Saudis, or whether the Biden administration would go along. 

With Saudi Arabia’s role in the latest oil production cut and said the administration was looking at options Biden said last week he was disappointed. From the White House on Monday to Menendez’s move there was no immediate reaction.

In the U.S. and Saudi relationship last week’s oil production cuts delivered one of the sharpest yet in a series of blows. Saudi killing of a U.S.-based journalists include the 2018, Jamal Khashoggi, the crown prince played a key role in which the U.S. intelligence community concluded. 

Americans also fault the crown prince for refusing to join the U.S.-led efforts to isolate and punish Putin for his February invasion of Ukraine, and for maintaining seemingly friendly relations with Putin.

“To play there simply is no room on both sides of this conflict. The rest of the free world is trying to stop a war criminal from violently wiping an entire country off of the map either you support or you support him,” Menendez said in his statement. “By economic self-interest the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia chose the latter in a terrible decision.”

Traveling to Saudi Arabia in July to deliver an awkward fist bump in a conciliatory gesture Biden had sought to patch relations with Prince Mohammed. 

Source:- https://livenewzus.com/with-saudis-to-freeze-cooperation-key-senate-chair-urges-us/

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