US president Donald Trump secured a $600 billion (€537 billion) commitment from Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to invest in the United States.
Mr Trump, who was beginning a tour of the Gulf states, was greeted by crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, who later signed an agreement with the president in Riyadh on defence, energy, mining and other areas.
The US agreed to sell Saudi Arabia an arms package worth nearly $142 billion (€127 billion), according to a White House fact sheet that called it “the largest defence co-operation agreement” Washington has ever done.
The agreement covers deals with more than a dozen US defence companies in areas including air and missile defence, air force and space advancement, maritime security and communications, the fact sheet said.
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“Today we hope for investment opportunities worth $600 billion, including deals worth $300 billion that were signed during this forum,” the Saudi crown prince said in a speech during a Saudi-US Investment Forum session held in Riyadh on the occasion of Mr Trump’s visit.
“We will work in the coming months on the second phase to complete deals and raise it to $1 trillion,” he said.
Saudi Arabia is one of the largest customers for US arms.
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Mr Trump, who was accompanied by US business leaders including billionaire Elon Musk, will go on from Riyadh to Qatar on Wednesday and the United Arab Emirates on Thursday.
He has not scheduled a stop in Israel, a decision that has raised questions about where the close ally stands in Washington’s priorities, and the focus of the trip is on investment rather than security matters in the Middle East.
Mr Trump left Israel off his schedule, although he wants Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu to agree to a new ceasefire deal in the 19-month-old Gaza war.
Israel’s military operations against Hamas in Gaza and Hizbullah in Lebanon, and its assassinations of the two Iran-allied groups’ leaders, have at the same time given Mr Trump more leverage by weakening Tehran and its regional allies.
US and Iranian negotiators met in Oman over the weekend to discuss a potential deal to curb Tehran’s nuclear programme. Mr Trump has threatened military action against Iran if diplomacy fails.
Mr Trump told the investment forum he wants to offer Iran a new and better path towards a more helpful future. If no new nuclear deal is reached, he said, Tehran will face maximum pressure.
Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, said last week he expected progress imminently on expanding accords brokered by Mr Trump in his 2017-21 first term, under which Arab states including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco recognised Israel.
Mr Trump said it was his “fervent hope” that Saudi Arabia would soon sign its own normalisation agreement with Israel, adding: “But you’ll do it in your own time.”
Mr Netanyahu’s opposition to a permanent stop to the war in Gaza or to the creation of a Palestinian state makes progress on similar talks with the Saudis unlikely, sources told Reuters.
Mr Trump also said he would order the lifting of sanctions on Syria at the behest of the crown prince, in a huge boost for interim Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa as he seeks to stabilise a country shattered by war. The US imposed sanctions on Syria during the rule of Bashar al-Assad, and had kept them in place since he was toppled from power in December after more than 13 years of war.
The US president also said he would send secretary of state Marco Rubio to Istanbul for talks on the war in Ukraine on Thursday.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday he would attend only if Russian president Vladimir Putin – who suggested the talks – is also there. The Kremlin has yet to say whether Mr Putin will take part.
Mr Trump is also sending Mr Witkoff and Keith Kellogg, three sources familiar with the plans said. Mr Kellogg earlier said that Mr Trump will show up in Istanbul if Mr Putin attends the talks.
– Reuters
