DUBAI: The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia sacked the deputy defence minister yesterday less than two months after he was appointed, the state news agency reported.
The royal decree said the decision to relieve Prince Khaled bin Bandar bin Abdulaziz of his post came upon the recommendation of Crown Prince Salman, the defence minister. No reason was given for the order.
Prince Khaled was moved to the post of deputy defence minister in May when King Abdullah removed him from his position as governor of Riyadh Province and appointed his son, Prince Turki, in his place.
King Abdullah has made a series of changes and appointments over the past two years. The most recent was the appointment of Prince Muqrin, the youngest of King Abdulaziz’s sons to survive into adulthood, as deputy crown prince, a newly created position that makes him next in line to rule after King Abdullah and Crown Prince Salman.
Saudi king vows to crush terrorists in Ramadan message
DUBAI: The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia, in a Ramadan message yesterday, vowed to crush Islamist militants threatening the kingdom, the state news agency reported, saying the world’s top oil exporter would not tolerate “a band of terrorists”.
The remarks came two days after the monarch ordered all necessary measures to protect the country against potential “terrorist threats” resulting from turmoil in neighbouring Iraq.
“We will not let a band of terrorists who have taken religion as a disguise behind which they hide private interests to terrorise the protected Muslims, to touch our homeland or any of its sons or its protected residents,” King Abdullah said in a message at the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Saudi Arabia crushed al Qaeda after the Islamist militant group began a campaign of bombings and attacks on vital installations and expatriate compounds in the kingdom.
Agencies
