Jamal Khashoggi: CIA director travels to Turkey to investigate murder of journalist as Trump hits out at Saudi response

'We’re going to get to the bottom of it', US president says

The director of the CIA was reportedly travelling to Turkey on Monday to help investigate the death of the murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Gina Haspel was travelling as part of the US government’s investigation after Khashoggi, who lived in Washington, disappeared after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October, Reuters reported.

It comes after Donald Trump said he was still not satisfied from what he had heard from Saudi Arabia about the killing.

The kingdom said Khashoggi was killed in a fight in the consulate, but Turkish officials said the 59-year-old was attacked and killed by a 15-man Saudi team.

“We’re going to get to the bottom of it. We have people over in Saudi Arabia now. We have top intelligence people in Turkey. They’re coming back either tonight or tomorrow,” the US president said before leaving the White House for a rally in Texas.

Western allies of Saudi Arabia are questioning whether the kingdom’s prince, Mohammed bin Salman, who has depicted himself as a reformer, has any culpability.

Last week, Mr Trump said the prince “totally” denied any knowledge of Khashoggi’s disappearance.

Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister later said Mr Khashoggi was murdered in a “rogue operation”.

Adel al-Jubeir told Fox News those responsible for “this huge and grave mistake” would be held accountable, but insisted Saudi officials did not know the whereabouts of the journalist’s remains.

Outrage over the murder of Khashoggi has frayed political and business ties between Western powers and Saudi Arabia.

But Mr Trump said any US response should not involve scrapping billions of dollars in arms sales, which he said would hurt US defence industries and eliminate US jobs.

“I don’t want to lose all of that investment that’s being made in our country,” he said.