MENA Mashup: The Saudi Cables

Wikileaks has released the first tranche of The Saudi Cables which contain “more than half a million cables and other documents from the Saudi Foreign Ministry that contain secret communications from various Saudi Embassies around the world.”

Quite literally it’s nothing but ‘Checkbook Diplomacy’…!

For example…

Buying Silence: How the Saudi Foreign Ministry controls Arab media

On Monday, Saudi Arabia celebrated the beheading of its 100th prisoner this year. The story was nowhere to be seen on Arab media despite the story’s circulation on wire services. Even international media was relatively mute about this milestone compared to what it might have been if it had concerned a different country. How does a story like this go unnoticed?

Today’s release of the WikiLeaks “Saudi Cables” from the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs show how it’s done.

The oil-rich Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and its ruling family take a systematic approach to maintaining the country’s positive image on the international stage. Most world governments engage in PR campaigns to fend off criticism and build relations in influential places. Saudi Arabia controls its image by monitoring media and buying loyalties from Australia to Canada and everywhere in between.

Documents reveal the extensive efforts to monitor and co-opt Arab media, making sure to correct any deviations in regional coverage of Saudi Arabia and Saudi-related matters. Saudi Arabia’s strategy for co-opting Arab media takes two forms, corresponding to the “carrot and stick” approach, referred to in the documents as “neutralisation” and “containment”. The approach is customised depending on the market and the media in question. {…}

The documents show concerns within the Saudi administration over the social upheavals of 2011, which became known in the international media as the “Arab Spring”. The cables note with concern that after the fall of Mubarak, coverage of the upheavals in Egyptian media was “being driven by public opinion instead of driving public opinion”. The Ministry resolved “to give financial support to influential media institutions in Tunisia”, the birthplace of the “Arab Spring”.

The cables reveal that the government employs a different approach for its own domestic media. There, a wave of the Royal hand is all that is required to adjust the output of state-controlled media. A complaint from former Lebanese Prime Minister and Saudi citizen Saad Hariri concerning articles critical of him in the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat and Asharq Al-Awsat newspapers prompted a directive to “stop these type of articles” from the Foreign Ministry.

This is a general overview of the Saudi Foreign Ministry’s strategy in dealing with the media. WikiLeaks’ Saudi Cables contain numerous other examples that form an indictment of both the Kingdom and the state of the media globally.

Unable to read Arabic myself, I’d been anxiously awaiting some input and I’ve since found this excellent resource in Global Voices

Wikileaks to Publish 500,000 Leaked Documents the Saudi Government Doesn’t Want its Citizens to See

Wikileaks has started publishing more than half a million leaked documents from Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. A total of 61,000 documents, in Arabic, are already online, creating a rich fodder of information on the secret correspondence behind the scenes in the Saudi corridors of power.

Saudis are however being warned from going anywhere near the leaked documents, sharing them or believing their contents. {…}

Understandably, the Saudi government is not pleased and has reached out to its citizens to ignore the cache, waving it off as the malicious work of “enemies of the nation.” In two separate tweets, the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs warns its citizens not to access the leaks.

It’s first tweet reads:

Dear Aware Citizen,
Don’t spread any documents that may be forged and which will help the enemies of the state achieve their goals

A follow up tweet, a few minutes later, elaborates:

Dear Aware Citizen,
Avoid accessing any websites with the aim of accessing documents or leaked information, which may be fabricated, with the goal of harming national security.

Although the tweets, which have been retweeted a few thousand times, fail to mention the Saudi Cables, netizens on Twitter were quick to pick the cue…

They then delve into the various countries…

Bahrain…

Saudi Cables Reveal How Saudi Arabia Saw Bahrain’s February 14 Uprising

It is no secret that the Saudi government has always shown full support for the Bahraini regime and sent the Peninsula Shield forces to crush the popular uprising in 2011.

Anti-government protests swept Bahrain’s streets on February 14, 2011, as protesters calling for democratic reforms and more freedoms. This movement irked the Bahraini government and its neighbor Saudi Arabia, who acted quickly and forcefully having learnt Arab Spring lessons from elsewhere in the region.

Some of the cables reveal how the Saudi government kept close tabs on international media coverage on Bahrain, monitoring media outlets which covered the protests and documenting all that was reported.

From the many tweets circulating on social media with photographs of different documents, this user tweeted a document that shows the Saudi government’s report on an article written by Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times on Shorouk News in 2012, in which he states the Bahraini government did not allow journalists and witnesses to observe the crackdown in Bahrain:

Some of the leaked documents from the Saudi Cables on WikiLeaks are the embassy’s and Saudi intelligence’s analysis of the revolution in Bahrain.

Another cable portrays the Shia community in Bahrain united against fragmented Sunni groups.

Saudi intelligence monitors the weakness and fragmentation of the Sunni forces versus Shiite forces in the events of Bahrain

The above document also states that officers and top officials not related to the Bahraini ruling family are complaining about having debts, not being appreciated and feeling that the government is willing to cut them loose in return for political gain.

It also mentions the Bahraini government’s attempt to slow down the internet was not successful because Shiite activists have other ways of communicating, while those that work with international organizations have phones provided for them.

The Saudi government document described visa procedures as very lenient, making it easy for Iranian, Iraqi and Lebanese nationals with foreign citizenships to obtain entry visas and offer help and guidance to the Shiite opposition. It called on the Bahraini government to tighten its grip on these procedures and close that loop hole.

Another document that also shows Saudi Arabia’s role in fueling the sectarian divide focuses on Bahrain’s leading Shia cleric Isa Qassim, also the spiritual leader of the Alwefaq National Islamic Society, the largest political bloc in Bahrain.

Saudi intelligence reports on the revolution of the Bahraini people and incites against Shaikh Isa Qassim.

The following telegram named “Assessing the situation in the host country” was issued by the Saudi Embassy in Manama. The analysis states there was a split within the Bahraini ruling family over how to deal with the escalation of Shiite-led protests on the first anniversary of the February 14 revolution.

The telegram described the security and political environment in the country as still very dangerous a year on from the outbreak of the February 14 events. The report says the Shiite opposition is dragging the situation out and buying time while dealing with government security measures.

The assessment also mentioned that there was pressure from Sunni government loyalists who complained about the soft approach taken in dealing with the Shiite street protests and not punishing those suspected of taking part in the “coup attempt”.

The Saudi government also sent a letter to the British Foreign Minister William Hague, and a duplicate letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, asking them to intervene in lifting the arms embargo on Bahrain, claiming the country is facing serious security challenges and violent acts supported by other regional forces.

Lebanon

#SaudiCables: What We’ve Learned So Far about Lebanon

…Among the many revelations leaked in the Cables are the implications of what Saudi Arabia’s money had done for both Lebanese politics and journalism. Indeed, according to cable ‘doc36598‘, Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces (LF), a Christian political party and part of the March 14 Alliance, sent a representative to request financial assistance from the Saudi government. Geagea is quoted as saying “I’m broke. I’m ready to do what the kingdom demands.” The request was done via a LF representative, Elie Abou Assi, who reported “difficulty of the financial situation of the party and to a certain extent have become unable to secure the salaries of employees in the party.”

Lebanese blogger Ramez Dagher of Moulahazat summarized it as such:

This cable is the diplomatic proof that Saudi Arabia helped the Lebanese Forces in their finances. In it, the Saudi foreign minister Saoud Al Faisal tells us that Samir Geagea’s man Elie Abou Assi met the Saudi ambassador and told him that the LF are struggling financially especially that they are countering two pro-Syrian foes (the Maronite patriarch and Aoun) and that Geagea is ready to travel to the KSA in order to solve the financial issues. The ambassador also said that the LF were ready to do as the Kingdom says. The wise Foreign minister also suggested that Sunni politicians be invited too (probably so that it doesn’t look fishy).

Another leak referred to Saudi Arabia’s policy of “Buying Silence“. As detailed in the report, “one of the ways ‘neutralisation’ and ‘containment’ are ensured is by purchasing hundreds or thousands of subscriptions in targeted publications. These publications are then expected to return the favour by becoming an “asset” in the Kingdom’s propaganda strategy. A document listing the subscriptions that needed renewal by 1 January, 2010, details a series of contributory sums meant for two dozen publications in Damascus, Abu Dhabi, Beirut, Kuwait, Amman and Nouakchott. The sums range from $500 to 9,750 Kuwaiti Dinars ($33,000). The Kingdom effectively buys reverse ‘shares’ in the media outlets, where the cash ‘dividends’ flow the opposite way, from the shareholder to the media outlet. In return Saudi Arabia gets political ‘dividends – an obliging press.’”

It is in this context that we discovered (doc83763) that the Saudi Government paid MTV, one of the main TV stations in Lebanon. MTV asked for $20 million but received $5 Million.

We also found out that another MP, Boutros Harb, requested money from Saudi Arabia in order to create a political party (doc32628).

Naturally, Iran features prominently in the Saudi Cables… Iran Features Heavily in the Latest WikiLeaks from Saudi Arabia

Pass the popcorn…!

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