Joe Biden wants to “reassess” the United States’ relationship with Saudi Arabia, a White House spokesperson said on Tuesday, as influential lawmakers call for an end to arms deliveries to Riyadh.
The US president “has been very clear that we have to continue to reassess this relationship, that we have to be ready to reconsider it,” said John Kirby, spokesman for the National Security Council, in an interview with the chain. CNN.
Joe Biden “is ready to work with Congress to reflect on what this relationship should be in the future,” he said.
“He wants to start these consultations now. I don’t think it has to wait, or even that it’s going to wait very long, ”said John Kirby.
OPEC+ — the 13 members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) led by Saudi Arabia and their 10 partners led by Russia — decided last week to slash its production quotas, a diplomatic snub for Joe Biden.
The president traveled to Saudi Arabia in July to meet Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, after having vowed to make the kingdom an international “pariah” following the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
The oil cartel’s decision sparked a wave of outrage among members of the US Congress.
The powerful head of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee threatened on Monday to block any future arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
“I must denounce the recent decision of the government of Saudi Arabia to help support Putin’s war [en Ukraine] through the OPEC+ cartel,” said Democratic Senator Bob Menendez.
Two other Democrats, Senator Richard Blumenthal and House Representative Ro Khanna, signed in Politico a tribune going in the same direction: “America should not deliver such unlimited control of strategic defense systems to a country apparently allied with our greatest enemy”.
In August, Washington announced that it would sell 300 Patriot missiles and their equipment to Saudi Arabia for 3.05 billion dollars.
The partnership between the United States and Saudi Arabia had been sealed after the end of the Second World War, providing the kingdom with military protection against access to oil for the Americans.
The strategic relationship, peppered with crises, had been relaunched by former President Donald Trump, with pharaonic arms sales at stake.