WWE Says They’re “Monitoring” Saudi Arabia’s Probable Murder of a Journalist

With Saudi Arabia in the news over the suspected murder of a journalist / Washington Post columnist, WWE has received renewed criticism about their upcoming show in Saudi Arabia on November 2.

In a brief statement, WWE said, “We are currently monitoring the situation.”

The Saudi government allegedly murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was born in Saudi Arabia but lived in the United States, and who has been critical of the Saudi crown prince, Mohammad Bin Salman. Khashoggi entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey on October 2 to get paperwork for his upcoming wedding, but his fiancee said that he never came out. Turkish officials say that he was murdered and his body was dismembered in the consulate by 15 Saudi agents and claim that they have audio and video evidence to prove it.

News outlets like the New York Times, LA Times and the Economist have now pulled out of a Saudi government-sponsored investor conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in two weeks, where the crown prince is scheduled to speak. Uber’s CEO has also pulled out. Several other huge corporations and billionaires are still apparently attending the conference, though.

This has all renewed the scrutiny on WWE, which has a ten year deal to run shows in Saudi Arabia, where they are paid several millions of dollars (estimated to be around $45 million per show). WWE’s last show, the Greatest Royal Rumble, was widely criticized because of the blatant propaganda that was aired during it, showing videos of people talking about how “progressive” the ultra-regressive monarchy is and showing a woman crying about how great it is to be a woman in Saudi Arabia, the worst country for women’s rights in the world.

Though WWE said that they are “monitoring the situation,” it seems very unlikely that they are going to throw away a ten year deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars. They haven’t backed out of it as Saudi Arabia mass murders children and starves millions of people in Yemen, or when Saudi Arabia recently jailed women activists who protested for the right to drive, so they’re probably just hoping that Saudi Arabia’s probable murder of a Washington Post columnist is eventually swept under the rug so they can continue to run paid propaganda informercials for the Saudi government in peace.

Update: US Senators Urge WWE to Rethink Its Relationship With Saudi Arabia