[ad_1]
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The son of murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi on Sunday appealed for the return of their father's body and announced that they would return to Saudi Arabia to bury him.
In an interview with CNN, Salah and Abdullah Khashoggi said that without their father's body, their family is unable to mourn and face the emotional burden of their father's death.
"This is not a normal situation, it is not at all a normal death.All we want, it is buried in Al-Baqi (cemetery) in Medina (Saudi Arabia) with the rest of her family, "Salah Khashoggi said. "I have talked to the Saudi authorities and I just hope it will happen soon."
Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist criticizing the Saudi government and his de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was killed after he joined the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2nd.
The Saudi authorities admitted that Khashoggi had been murdered during a premeditated action, revising previous statements that his death was unintentional. Turkish officials and US lawmakers said that Crown Prince Mohammed had ordered the murder, an allegation denied.
Khashoggi's body has not been found and the Saudi authorities are conducting an official investigation.
Saudi billionaire Alwaleed bin Talal, an international businessman, said Sunday that the investigation would exonerate the country's leader.
On October 24, Salah Khashoggi met with the Crown Prince and King Salman in Riyadh to receive condolences as well as other members of the Khashoggi family. Salah left for Washington a day later, and his interview for CNN was his first public comment since.
He added that King Salman had assured him that those involved in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi would be brought to justice.
"We just have to make sure that he is resting in peace," Salah Khashoggi said of his father. "Until now, I still can not believe he's dead, it does not engulf me emotionally," he said, adding that there had been a lot "misinformation" about the circumstances of death.
Salah said the accusations that his father was a supporter of the organization of the Muslim Brotherhood were not true.
When asked how one should remember Khashoggi, Salah replied: "As a moderate man sharing the same values with everyone … a man who loves his country, who believes in it so much and in its potential. "
"Jamal has never been a dissident.He believed in the monarchy, that is what makes the country united.And he believed in the transformation that he undergoes."
(Report by David Lawder, edited by Susan Thomas)
