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Just days after the brutal killing of prominent Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi in Turkey in the fall of 2018, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman dispatched a group of hitmen, known as the Tiger Squad, to Canada to seek out and kill one of his former top intelligence officials who had sought exile in Toronto, according to a newly filed lawsuit.
Even though the scheme was thwarted when the group failed to get past suspicious border officers at Pearson International Airport, Saad Aljabri’s life remains in “dire peril,” the lawsuit says.
Aljabri believes two of his children, who were detained in Saudi Arabia earlier this year and whose whereabouts are not known, are now being used as “human bait” to lure him out of hiding.
The explosive allegations are contained in a lawsuit filed with the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. Aljabri is seeking unspecified damages from bin Salman and his associates for orchestrating an “attempted extrajudicial killing” and for violating international law.
None of the allegations have been proven in court. The Star is seeking to corroborate the allegations with Canadian law-enforcement agencies and has reached out to Saudi embassy officials in Ottawa and Washington, as well as Global Affairs Canada, for comment.
The lawsuit alleges Aljabri was targeted because of his close ties with the U.S. intelligence community, “intimate” knowledge of bin Salman’s activities and potential to undermine bin Salman’s influence and support from the Trump White House.
“That combination of deep knowledge and enduring trust by top U.S. officials is why there is virtually no one defendant bin Salman wants dead more than Dr. Saad,” the lawsuit says.
The targeting of Aljabri, the lawsuit alleges, is part of a wider campaign by the crown prince to silence dissidents, including the murder of Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, in the kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul. (The crown prince has denied he ordered that killing).
The legal action is playing out against a messy political backdrop between Canada and Saudi Arabia, a key player in the Arab world and major oil exporter. Earlier this year, Ottawa announced it would resume military exports to Saudi Arabia after putting a freeze on new permits in 2018 over human rights concerns.
During his decades-long career with the Saudi government, Aljabri developed a close relationship with U.S. intelligence officials on counterterrorism files and was credited with helping to thwart a bomb attack in the U.S. by an al-Qaida affiliate, according to the court filing.
Aljabri was also an aide to Mohammed bin Nayef, who was a rival to bin Salman in a bid for the throne. After receiving intelligence that his life might be in danger, Aljabri fled the kingdom in May 2017, first to Turkey, then to Canada, according to the lawsuit.
In June 2017, bin Salman ousted bin Nayef in a palace coup and became the de-facto ruler. In the ensuing months, bin Salman allegedly tried to pressure Aljabri into returning to Saudi Arabia in a series of WhatsApp messages — threatening to use “all available means” to find him and telling him, “We shall certainly reach you.”
According to the lawsuit, bin Salman deployed a “network of covert agents” in the U.S. to try to track down Aljabri’s whereabouts. These agents allegedly approached Aljabri’s son and family friends in Boston.
It is also alleged that bin Salman went so far as to try to arrange the arrest of Aljabri through Interpol, the international police agency, accusing Aljabri of corruption. (The New York Times has reported that Interpol ultimately removed Aljabri’s name from its system because of concerns that the Saudi request was politically motivated).
According to the lawsuit, FBI agents warned Aljabri’s son in early 2018 that there were credible threats against the family. Then in October 2018, a couple of weeks after the murder of Khashoggi, a team of Saudi nationals travelled to Toronto “with the intention of killing (Aljabri).”
It is alleged the “hit squad” tracked Aljabri to Canada after installing malware on his phone.
“Carrying two bags of forensic tools, and complete with forensic personnel experienced with the cleanup of crime scenes — including an instructor in the exact same criminal evidence department as the forensic specialist who dismembered Khashoggi with a bone saw — the Tiger Squad Defendants attempted to enter Canada covertly, travelling on tourist visas and seeking to avert the detection of Canadian border security by entering through separate kiosks,” the court document states.
But the group didn’t make it far.
It is alleged that when Canadian border security officers asked them if they knew each other, they lied and said they did not.
“On information and belief, shortly thereafter, during secondary screening, Canadian officials found a photo of some of the Tiger Squad Defendants together, revealing their lie and thwarting their mission.”
Despite the thwarted mission, Aljabri continues to believe his life is in danger and fears that bin Salman wants to send agents from the U.S. into Canada by land to “complete the job.”
In March, dozens of armed men stormed the Aljabri family home in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, abducted two of Aljabri’s children — Omar and Sarah, both in their early 20s — and took them to an unknown location, according to the lawsuit. Other relatives have also been detained.
Aljabri believes the family members are being used as a “crude form of human bait in an effort to lure (him) to Saudi Arabia so that he can be killed.”
