Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Sunday rebuked allegations Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was in any way culpable in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi — calling Khashoggi's death a "tremendous mistake" and blaming the security team that interrogated him.
In an interview with Fox News' chief political anchor Breg Baier, Adel al-Jubeir also rebuffed the claims of complicity from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and his call for a cutoff in arms to the nation in earlier on "Fox News Sunday."
Al-Jubeir offered a timeline of their version of events, and said the killing was a "huge and grave mistake," conceding there was an attempt to cover it up, and they are trying to find the remains of Khashoggi.
He said the fluid nature of the investigation of the incident was the cause for any shifts in an explanation by the government.
According to Jubeir, the blame should be placed on the security team.
"They told us [Khashoggi] left the consulate, came back to Saudi Arabia, filed a report to that effect," he said.
"The reports we were getting from Turkey did not comport with those that the team has provided to us after they returned to Saudi Arabia."
He also asserted after an investigation was ordered, they "discovered there were discrepancies," and "discovered he was killed in the consulate."
"We don't know in details how," the foreign minister said. "We don't know where the body is," but added investigators "are working" on specifics.
"The individuals who did this did this outside the scope of their authority," al-Jubeir declared. "There obviously was a tremendous mistake made and what compounded the mistake would be the attempt to try to cover up. That is unacceptable in any government. These things unfortunately happened."
"This an aberration, this is a mistake, this is a criminal act, and those responsible for it will be punished," he insisted.
". . . The crown prince was not aware of this," he said. "This was an operation that was a rogue operation. This was an operation where individuals ended up exceeding the authorities and responsibilities they had. They made the mistake when they killed Jamal Khashoggi in the consulate, and they tried to cover up for it."
As for Paul's criticism earlier Sunday, al-Jubeir dismissed it as based on "emotion" from "six thousand miles away."
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