Saudi Arabia Modern History
The military commitment of the United States and the major Western powers determined the defeat of Iraq and the liberation of Kuwait (Gulf War, January-February 1991), but at the same time the whole affair had highlighted the structural weaknesses of the Saudi defense system which had proved unable to cope with the dangers coming from other states in the region without the US umbrella. With the new situation, also in order to contain the destabilizing attempts of the Shiite groups present in the country, Saudi Arabia in 1991 re-established diplomatic relations with Iran while resuming a policy of support to the Arab states in greater difficulty and to the PLO itself.. But it was the insufficiency of the military apparatus that distressed the Riyadh regime, as it was evident that the substantial investments in the sector were not enough (15 billion dollars between 1991 and 1992). Even after the Iraqi defeat, therefore, a US presence was necessary, albeit greatly reduced, but this ended up fueling a fundamentalist opposition which was already quite lively and which also touched some elements of the official religious hierarchy. A presence, the fundamentalist one, difficult to eradicate despite the numerous arrests carried out between 1994 and 1995 and the more careful control of immigrants (100,000 expelled in February 1995). These measures, in fact, were not sufficient to prevent the emergence of new anti-US terrorist phenomena that resulted in the attack on the headquarters of the military advisers in Riyadh (November 1995) and in the more serious attack on the Khobar air base (June 1996) which caused the death of 19 soldiers and the wounding of many dozen men. Signs of these internal difficulties also came from the labor of the management team, as evidenced by the extensive reshuffle with which 16 of the 28 ministers were changed in August 1995.
Added to this were the precarious health conditions of King Fahd who, in January 1996, temporarily handed over his powers to his half-brother Abdallah. While the new relations with Yemen led to a border agreement in 2000 (the de facto sovereignty exercised by Saudi Arabia over the southern provinces of Asīr, Najrān and Jīzān had been the cause of recurring disputes), no hidden tensions occurred with the United States, as the Saudi government was opposed to the American area raids against Iraq, conducted since 1997 to oust S. Ḥusayn, and US policy towards the Palestinians. In terms of domestic politics, despite the de facto withdrawal from power of King Fahd, the tensions present within the royal family prevented an official transfer of power, even if Prince Abdallah consolidated his authority by giving impetus to economic renewal (reduction of the public debt, privatizations, opening the country to foreign investment) entrusted to a Supreme Economic Council and a Supreme Council for oil and mineral resources, created respectively in 1999 and 2000. Trying to act as a mediator in many Maghreb conflicts (between Morocco and Algeria for Western Sahara, between the United States and Libya), Abdallah at the same time continued to oppose the reintegration of Iraq into the Arab world and continued in the policy of rapprochement with Iran, judging the electoral victory of the reformers in this country (2000) a progress for the intensification of trade and for the stability of the entire region. In December 2000, Saudi Arabia signed members of the Gulf Cooperation Council with Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and United Arab Emirates, a project for the creation of a common currency by 2005 and a mutual defense pact aimed above all at facing the Iraqi threat. The war against Iraq, waged by the Anglo-American coalition in 2003, and the consequent fall of Saddam Ḥusayn’s regime, thwarted the Iraqi threat, but triggered strong tensions in the country, as demonstrated by the serious terrorist attacks against some residential neighborhoods inhabited by Western and Arab and against government buildings, in Riyadh, which occurred both in the same year and in the following one. In February 2005, for the first time in the history of the kingdom, administrative elections were held, with universal male suffrage, limited to half of the seats (50% of which remain nominated by the director). On 1 August of the same year, King Fahd died and the crown was passed to the crown prince ‘Abd Allāh bin ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Al Saʿūd known as King Abdullah (Riyāḍ, 1924); Defense Minister Sultan Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud has become the new crown prince (who died in 2012, however).
In January 2007, according to aceinland, the President of the Russian Federation V. Putin made an official visit to the country, signing trade and technological cooperation agreements. In the same year 143 death sentences were carried out, arousing controversy in international public opinion. In 2012 Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud became the new crown prince and succeeded his father ‘Abd Allah who died in 2015. In March 2015, the country intervened directly in the Yemeni civil war by bombing the positions of Shiite militants. Putin made an official visit to the country signing trade and technological cooperation agreements. In the same year 143 death sentences were carried out, arousing controversy in international public opinion. In 2012 Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud became the new crown prince and succeeded his father ‘Abd Allah who died in 2015. In March 2015, the country intervened directly in the Yemeni civil war by bombing the positions of Shiite militants. Putin made an official visit to the country signing trade and technological cooperation agreements. In the same year 143 death sentences were carried out, arousing controversy in international public opinion. In 2012 Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud became the new crown prince and succeeded his father ‘Abd Allah who died in 2015. In March 2015, the country intervened directly in the Yemeni civil war by bombing the positions of Shiite militants.
