Istanbul’s Public Prosecutor’s Office has prepared an indictment against 20 Saudis in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate 17 months ago in Istanbul. The former intelligence chief, Ahmad Asiri and former adviser to the royal court, Saud Al-Qahtani, were both on the list for “instigated premeditated murder with monstrous intent.” Eighteen others were accused of carrying out the killing of Khashoggi, who was a US resident at the time of his murder and writing for The Washington Post. The indictment was based on the analysis of the suspects’ mobile phone records, their entry and exit information to Turkey, their presence at the consulate, witness accounts, and Khashoggi’s mobile, tablet and iPad data. The CIA, along with several western governments, eventually concluded that the crown prince had ordered Khashoggi’s assassination. The kingdom has denied such claims, instead blaming rogue agents who it says took a repatriation mission too far. Arrest warrants for the suspects have already been issued but since none are in the country a trial in absentia will be opened at an unspecified date, the prosecutor has said. Turkey is seeking life imprisonment in all 20 cases. Saudi Arabia has rejected Turkish calls for the suspects’ return to face trial in Turkey. In December last year a Saudi court sentenced five unidentified people to death over Khashoggi’s killing but in effect exonerated Prince Mohammed’s inner circle. The Saudi prosecutors also ruled that there had been no premeditation to kill at the beginning of the repatriation mission, a finding at odds with a UN inquiry published in June 2019 and now the Turkish indictment. Agnès Callamard, the UN special rapporteur who authored the inquiry into Khashoggi’s death but was barred from access to the secretive Saudi trial, called the ruling a mockery of justice.