Saudi Foreign Minister Repeats Warning To US Over Sept 11 Law
The biggest financial and geopolitical story from mid-April was Saudi Arabia’s threat that should the US pass a bipartisan law which would take away immunity from foreign governments in cases arising from a “terrorist attack that kills an American on American soil” and specifically could hold the Saudi kingdom responsible for its role in the Sept 11, 2001 attacks, then the Saudis would retaliate by selling up to $750 billion in American assets.
Today, the Saudi foreign minister Adel al-Jubeir, while speaking to reporters in Geneva after talks with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry which mainly focused on Syria, admitted this threat saying passage of the law would “erode global investor confidence in America” by which he was, of course, referring only to Saudi Arabia. However, to avoid another slap in the face of US foreign policy on the record, he denied that Saudi Arabia had “threatened” to withdraw investment from its close ally and instead called it a mere “warning.”
“We say a law like this would cause an erosion of investor confidence. But then to kind of say, ‘My God the Saudis are threatening us’ – ridiculous,” Jubeir hedged according to Reuters.
Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir talks to the media in
Geneva, May 2, 2016
“We don’t use monetary policy and we don’t use energy policy and we don’t use economic policy for political purposes. When we invest, we invest as investors. When we sell oil, we sell oil as traders.”
That said we are confident that Jubeir realizes very well that everyone else uses monetary and energy policy for political purposes – hence the Trasury’s brand new Friday watchlist for currency manipulators – which is why when he calls it “erosion of investor confidence” the world reads clearly between the lines.
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