{"id":30812,"date":"2019-01-27T20:22:59","date_gmt":"2019-01-27T20:22:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=30812"},"modified":"2019-01-27T20:22:59","modified_gmt":"2019-01-27T20:22:59","slug":"saudi-billionaire-mohammed-al-amoudi-released-from-detention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=30812","title":{"rendered":"Saudi billionaire Mohammed al-Amoudi released from detention"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Saudi Arabia has freed Saudi-Ethiopian billionaire Mohammed al-Amoudi,\u00a0more than a year after the tycoon was detained under the kingdom’s controversial anti-corruption campaign.<\/p>\n

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed confirmed Amoudi’s release on Twitter<\/a> on Sunday, saying he had raised the issue with\u00a0Crown Prince\u00a0<\/span>Mohammed bin Salman<\/span>\u00a0(<\/span>MBS<\/a>)\u00a0<\/span>during a trip to Riyadh last May.<\/p>\n

A family office spokesman told Reuters that Amoudi had returned to his home in the western city of Jeddah.<\/p>\n

Amoudi was detained at Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton hotel in November 2017 along with dozens of princes, officials and businessmen after MBS launched his so-called “anti-corruption purge”.<\/p>\n

Allegations against those detained included money laundering, bribery, and extorting officials.<\/p>\n

The crackdown was in response to “exploitation by some of the weak souls who have put their own interests above the public interest, in order to illicitly accrue money,” a royal decree at the time said.<\/p>\n

Most were freed after reaching settlement deals with the government, including Saudi businessman and billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.<\/p>\n

Downgraded by\u00a0Forbes<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

Amoudi’s release follows that of several other businessmen last week and comes after the kingdom suffered a global backlash over the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the reported torture of women activists.<\/p>\n

Amoudi, who was born in Ethiopia<\/a> to a Yemeni father and an Ethiopian mother, owns a broad portfolio of businesses in construction, energy, agriculture, mining, hotels, healthcare<\/a> and manufacturing.<\/p>\n

According to a Forbes report last year, his net worth was estimated to be $10.9bn. Forbes downgraded his net worth earlier this month to $1.2bn “due to a lack of clarity about which assets he still owns”.<\/p>\n

It is unclear how much, if any, of Amoudi’s wealth he may have handed over to the state in exchange for his release.<\/p>\n

The Saudi authorities did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

Saudi Arabia’s Attorney General Sheikh Saud al-Mojeb said last January that the kingdom had seized more than $100bn in anti-corruption settlements.<\/p>\n

Experts have noted that the arrests were a way for MBS to consolidate economic, as well as political, power in Saudi Arabia<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\n SOURCE:
\n Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saudi Arabia has freed Saudi-Ethiopian billionaire Mohammed al-Amoudi,\u00a0more than a year after the tycoon was detained under the kingdom’s controversial anti-corruption campaign. Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed confirmed Amoudi’s release on Twitter on Sunday, saying he had raised the issue with\u00a0Crown Prince\u00a0Mohammed bin Salman\u00a0(MBS)\u00a0during a trip to Riyadh last May. A family office spokesman told…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":30813,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}