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The newspaper’s report stated that, “in early November 2017, around 400 of the most influential figures in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, including princes, business leaders and ministers, were arrested and detained inside the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, in the process that became the country’s largest and most controversial purge. A history of the modern kingdom. “
Prominent figures who were detained revealed details of what they say happened, as former detainees, many of whom were stripped of their wealth, told stories of the arrests that often began with a phone call to summon the characters to meetings. with Prince Mohammed or King Salman himself.
In other cases, two prominent businessmen said: “They were asked to meet in a house and waited for a royal court adviser to join them, but instead, State Security agents appeared and took them to the Five Star Prison, where guards and superior assistants were waiting for them. “
A source with close knowledge of what happened said that “The first night, everyone was bandaged and exposed to what Egyptian intelligence called” the night of the beating. ” People were asked if they knew the reason for their presence there, but no one knew of course and most were beaten, which was Sometimes, he was severely tied to the wall, while some were tied to the wall in stressful situations, and the affair went on for hours, and all those involved in these torture operations were Saudis.
Speaking of the researchers, the source said: “There is a misconception that they came knowing everything, big and small, with detailed pages of data and information, but they weren’t, and in fact they knew very little. His knowledge of assets outside the country was very limited. “
Some detainees reported being threatened with divulging private information, such as extramarital affairs or businesses that would not have obtained approval even under the old regime. No information was leaked, but the few details that did appear gave importance to the calls that Ibrahim Wardi, assistant professor of international finance at Fletcher College of Tufts University in the United States, received in mid-2017 from alumni asking about prominent Saudi figures who They explored their careers during their work session, poetry. That something big was on the horizon in Riyadh, and he was right.
The men questioned were stunned by the researchers’ poor understanding of investment structures. The source familiar with the Ritz events said: “They were guessing people’s net worth and that wealthy prisoners were subjected to extortion and at some point allowed people to log into their email and access their phones, and ordered them to contact Geneva bank relations managers and ask for large sums of money, but the callers told investigators. ” That the accounts had no capital, so the researchers believed that all assets were cash. “
The source told “The Guardian”: “Interrogators often had no idea what they were looking for, and the matter turned into outright blackmail in some cases, as some of the detainees refused to sign anything. they took the proper legal measures, as there is no system. ” Saudi justice is about something like negotiating to reduce the sentence, but this is what they were trying to impose by force. ”
