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ISTANBUL – President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday raised the stakes in Saudi Arabia over what he called the '' premeditated murder '' of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, demanding that Riyadh supply more answers and hand over the Saudi suspects to face justice in Turkey.
After saying he would reveal "the naked truth" about Mr. Khashoggi's death, Mr. Erdogan, sketching the chronology of a broad operation.
The 15-member team of senior officials, senior intelligence officers and forensic officials, Mr. Erdogan said. The Saudis also conducted in rural areas where investigators have been searching for Mr. Khashoggi's remains, the president said.
"It is clear that this savage murder did not happen instantly but was planned," Mr. Erdogan said, challenging the official Saudi account.
But while Mr. Erdogan offered some new details and confirmed others, Mr. Erdogan had no intention of dropping a case that has created an international furor.
He has been aided by the Saudis for an honest accounting of his country, and has posed a series of tough questions, throwing down a challenge to the Saudi leadership.
'' Why was a team of 15 Saudi men, all with qualifications related to the incident, gathering in Istanbul on the day of the murder? We are seeking answers to this question. What are we doing here? "
Saudi Arabia has said that 18 officials were under investigation in the killing, but Mr. Erdogan said that he would call King Salman of Saudi Arabia and ask for it in Istanbul, not in Riyadh or elsewhere in Saudi Arabia.
The killing of Mr. Khashoggi, 59, inside the Saudi Consulate raised questions of international law and diplomatic conventions that concerned the entire world community, Mr. Erdogan said, clearly trying to broaden the pressure on the Saudi government.
"This murder could have been committed to a consulate building which may be considered in the United Arab Emirates," Mr. Erdogan said, adding that international agreements on the status of consular property this murder to be concealed behind the armor of immunity. "
Mr Khashoggi left the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul alive on Oct. 2, before it reversed course. Since Mr. Khashoggi was killed inside the consulate, Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, who has claimed that his death was accidental and that the operation was not authorized by the country's crown prince.
Mr. Erdogan's much-anticipated address, to the weekly meeting of the Parliament Chamber in Ankara, which is more important than any other issue.
Mr. Erdogan promised on Sunday that he would reveal the details of Turkey's investigation in his speech on Tuesday. Mr. Khashoggi's disappearance, but he had a behind-the-scenes battle against a campaign of government and international news outlets.
Confirming many of those details on Tuesday, the Turkish president outlined the timeline of events since Sept. 28, when Mr. Khashoggi first visited the Saudi Consulate to request documents to allow him to marry his Turkish fiancée.
Immediately after Mr. Khashoggi's first visit to the consulate, some of the consular staff left for Saudi Arabia, Mr. Erdogan said. "Planning, a road map started to be established there," he said. "Some of the consulate staff going to their country in a hurry that the preparations were made there."
"Some information being evaluated by our security and intelligence units to an absolutely premeditated act," he added. But he warned that it would not be possible for the world to be killed.
"Putting all the burden on the international community," he said. "We could be satisfied only if everyone is in the lead, they are called to account."
This was the closest Mr. Erdogan came to call out Prince Mohammed, who has denied any knowledge of the plot close to many of the suspects.
Mr. Erdogan has been deferenced to the Saudi king, but he has been investigated, and the presiding judge has suggested that it may not be acceptable to oversee the intelligence service.
"I do not doubt the sincerity of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Salman bin Abdulaziz," Mr. Erdogan said. "Still, such a critical investigation should be conducted by a fair committee which has no doubt of connection to the murder. If they are any partner in crime in other countries, they must be included in the investigation. "
Mr. Erdogan pointed out that there was more information about the case and the fact that it had been made known to the United Kingdom and the United Kingdom. inside the consulate.
And with rhetorical flair, he is still in the room.
"Why has the consulate general not been opened right away but days after? We're seeking answers. When the murder was so clear, why have so many inconsistent statements been made? Why has the body of someone, the death of those who have been officially admitted, not been found? "
Although Mr. Erdogan was careful to avoid a clash with Riyadh, the Saudi prevarication has clearly angered him. He told journalists that he had complained to a high-level that the consul had "frivolous."
Mr. Erdogan's promise to give the unvarnished truth to a new flurry of diplomatic activity. Mr. Erdogan had a phone call with President Trump over the weekend, and the two discussed the Khashoggi case, the national security adviser and presidential spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said at a news conference in Ankara on Monday.
Political analysts describe two camps among political leaders: those who want to take a backseat to the scandal to blow over, and those who want to take action against the kingdom and even the crown prince.
On Sunday, the spokesman for Mr. Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development Party, Omer Celik, dismissed any suggestion of a treaty between Turkey and Saudi Arabia or indeed between Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the United States.
"The claim of negotiations is immoral," he said at a news briefing in Ankara. "It is our duty to honor the truth. This is a situation in which Turkey is appreciated. "
Turkish officials echoed Mr. Erdogan's challenge to the Saudi government – and to the crown prince in particular – to come clean. Yet there were signs of softness amid the outrage.
"The issue is to reveal a vicious murder," Mr. Kalin, the presidential spokesman, said at a news conference in Ankara on Monday.
"Our president is clear from the beginning," he added. "It is our duty and love to reveal the event in all its details. "This is going to be a secret," he said, adding: "Saudi Arabia is a brother country to us."
After listening to Mr. Erdogan's speech on Tuesday, Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said, "He does not want to break up with the Saudi King."
"Erdogan has always been deferential to the king, whom he respects as the protector of Islam's holy mosques, and has decided to separate himself from the king," he said.
The speech pointed to a success of American mediation in the affair, Mr. Cagaptay said, adding, "Erdogan has agreed to give these efforts more time."
Mr. Erdogan, President of the United States, has recently become a newcomer to the news, rather than dropping new bombshells. And he did not mention Turkish officials' claims that his government had audio and video recordings of the killing, and that Mr. Khashoggi was dismembered with a bone saw inside the consulate.
But while not directly implicating the Crown Prince, Mr. Erdogan was charging him with responsibility nonetheless. "He's embracing a strategy on MBS to undermine him in the long term," Mr. Cagaptay wrote in an email, referring to Prince Mohammed by his initials.
Mr. Erdogan was still intent on internationalizing the Khashoggi case to engage international pressure, particularly from the United States, on Riyadh to replace or sideline Prince Mohammed, Galip Dalay, a nonresident fellow at the Brookings Doha Center and a visiting scholar at Oxford University, said in comments before the speech.
"Turkey wants him or her dramatically reduced," he said.
Nevertheless, Mr. Dalay added, Mr. Erdogan does not want a direct fight with Saudi Arabia. "He does not want to turn this into a bilateral argument between Saudi Arabia and Turkey," he said of the Turkish president. "He wants to be on one side MBS and on the other a murdered journalist."
