The fiancee of slain Saudi critic Jamal Khashoggi joined a chorus of voices on Sunday imploring Justin Bieber not to perform at the kingdom’s Formula One race next month, adding to growing requests for him to cancel the show.
Hatice Cengiz encouraged Justin Bieber to postpone his December 5 performance in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, in an open letter published by The Washington Post, to “send a forceful statement to the world that your name and talent will not be used to repair the reputation of a regime that executes its critics.”
Other F1 concert performers include rapper A$AP Rocky, DJs David Guetta and Tiesto, and singer Jason Derulo. Bieber’s concert is the most headline-grabbing performance scheduled for the race in Jiddah.
It’s not the first time a music star has been pressured to cancel a Saudi Arabian concert. Following the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi operatives in Turkey in October 2018, Mariah Carey was the most well-known musician to visit Saudi Arabia. She dismissed demands for a boycott of the show.
Nicki Minaj, on the other hand, canceled her presence on stage at a concert in Jiddah in 2019 due to public outcry, telling reporters at the time that she wanted to show support for women’s rights, homosexual rights, and freedom of expression.
Khashoggi’s assassination in 2018 was carried out by members of a group of 15 Saudi government operatives dispatched to Istanbul, where the writer and former government spokesman had an appointment at the Saudi consulate for documents required for his marriage to Cengiz. She waited outside the embassy for him, but he never came out. His remains were never discovered.
The assassination by agents working for the crown prince garnered international condemnation and placed a pall over the prince, whose image never fully recovered. Prince Mohammed has stated that he was unaware of the operation that killed Jamal Khashoggi. However, a US intelligence assessment made public under President Joe Biden found that the crown prince had given his approval to the operation.
In her open letter to Bieber, Cengiz said, “Please know that your invitation to perform in a concert in Jiddah comes directly from MBS, as the crown prince is known.” “Nothing significant happens in Saudi Arabia without his permission, especially an event as significant and spectacular as this.”
Bieber’s performance in Saudi Arabia comes only weeks before he kicks off a global tour in February that was postponed due to the pandemic in 2020.
Since then, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, led by Prince Mohammed, has bought shares in Live Nation, the firm that owns Ticketmaster and organizes concerts for Bieber and other big names. The Public Investment Fund bought $500 million worth of Live Nation stock last year as the company’s stock dropped due to COVID-19 lockdowns and the cancellation of thousands of shows.
According to public documents, the Saudi wealth fund is now Live Nation’s second-largest institutional shareholder, with a $1.4 billion investment.
Human Rights Watch has also called on Bieber and the other singers to withdraw from the F1 concerts in Saudi Arabia, claiming that the events are intended to “sport wash” the country’s human rights record by diverting attention and deflecting criticism away from it.
The majority of concertgoers are Saudi youth, who are taking advantage of the country’s growing social developments, which allow for music and gender mingling. Sports, according to the General Sports Authority of the monarchy, are an instrument for social transformation inside the kingdom.
Saudi Arabia will host the Formula One race for the first time next month, while the monarchy has previously hosted the lesser-known Formula-E race in a bid to improve the country’s status as a tourism destination.
The crown prince was being praised at the time of Khashoggi’s murder for ushering in social reforms that had transformed the lives of many people inside the nation. Khashoggi had been penning pieces for The Washington Post in which he criticized the crown prince’s impulsive foreign policy initiatives as well as the crackdown on activists and perceived critics, including women’s rights campaigners, writers, clerics, and economists.
Saudi Arabia held a trial for some of those implicated in his assassination, and five were sentenced to death before being spared from execution.
The fiancee of Jamal Khashoggi has told reporters that she will continue to speak out in the hopes of giving voice to others who remain imprisoned in Saudi Arabia for expressing their views.
