British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his accompanying delegation arrived in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Wednesday for an official visit, where they were received by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said that the Saudi Minister of Energy attended the meeting and that the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to form a Strategic Partnership Council.
Johnson is on a tour to visit the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia in an effort to urge oil-producing countries to help lower their prices, as Europe seeks to reduce its dependence on Russian crude after the invasion of Ukraine.
The British PM is hoping that he will be able to persuade the two countries to Gulf countries to increase their oil production to mitigate the impact of the economic sanctions imposed on Moscow on global energy prices.
In addition to the oil issue, the visit has important political implications, as Johnson is one of the few Western leaders to visit the kingdom to meet the crown prince — the de facto ruler — since the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in his country’s consulate in Istanbul in 2018.
The short tour also comes after Saudi authorities executed 81 people that were charged with terrorism and joining armed organisations on Saturday.
Johnson said that a new alliance was needed to prevent Russia from holding Western countries hostage to energy supplies, sidestepping questions from the very same Western news outlets calling for intervention from OPEC countries on whether cooperating with countries whose “human rights record is under criticism” is an appropriate price to address the skyrocketing oil prices.
