Elon Musk has shut down claims that Tesla is in ‘early’ talks to open an EV plant in Saudi Arabia.

A report from the Wall Street Journal stated Monday that Saudi Arabia has ‘been wooing’ Tesla with promises of the right to purchase certain quantities of metals and minerals the company needs for its EVs 

A deal with the Saudis could help Musk achieve his ambitious goal of selling 20 million vehicles a year by 2030 – up from just 1.3 million sold in 2022.

However, Musk hit back at the WSJ on X, posting a screenshot of the article with the caption: ‘Yet another utterly false article from WSJ.’ 

The WSJ report claims that people familiar with the discussion said Saudi Arabia is in talks with Tesla about setting up a  manufacturing facility there.

The move, if true, would be part of an ambitious push by Saudi Arabia to diversify its economy away from oil and secure metals needed to make electric cars.

‘The talks are at a very early stage and could fall apart. Any deal could be fraught with complications, given Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk’s contentious relationship with the Saudis,’ reads the article.

The report from the Wall Street Journal comes just hours after Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan asked Musk to build a vehicle factory in Turkey, according to the country’s communications directorate.

Musk will also meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in California on Monday.

Saudi Arabia is said to be sourcing quantities of metals and minerals from other countries, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, the report said.

Democratic Republic of Congo is said to hold the world’s largest cobalt mines, mined workers ‘laboring in slave-like conditions.’ 

These workers include tens of thousands of children as young as four. 

But, it is unknown how Saudi Arabia will source minerals from the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

Saudi Arabia has been trying to shift its economy away from oil and signing billion-dollar deals with several countries to collaborate on developing, manufacturing and selling electric vehicles.

In June, Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Investment signed a $5.6 billion deal with Chinese electric car maker Human Horizon.

The US-based Lucid Group announced in August that its first overseas plant in Saudi Arabia is set to start limited production of Lucid Air EVs this month.

However, Musk’s Tesla brand currently leads the Middle East EV market. 

One of the proposals the kingdom is considering involves extending financing to commodities trader Trafigura for a flailing Congo cobalt and copper project, which could help provide a Tesla factory with supplies, the WSJ report said.

A Trafigura spokesperson said the trader was reviewing its options for the Mutoshi project in Congo amid rising costs and persistently low cobalt prices.

Tesla did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment, while Saudi Arabia’s sovereign fund, the Public Investment Fund, declined to comment.

Musk said in May that Tesla would probably pick a location for a new factory by the end of 2023. 

The company has six factories and is building a seventh in Mexico in northern Nuevo Leon state.

The WSJ’s claims come amid a series of high-profile human rights abuses by the authoritative regime in Saudi Arabia, which has been cracking down increasingly hard on peaceful dissent.

Last month, a court sentenced a retired Saudi teacher to death over a series of critical tweets of the regime. 

Mohammad bin Nasser al-Ghamdi, 54, was accused of ‘using his accounts on Twitter and YouTube to follow and promote individuals who seek to destabilize public order.’

Biden leaves for New Delhi as polls raise questions about his 2024 run

By Nikki Schwab, Senior U.S. Political Reporrter In Charleston, South Carolina

Published: 08:13 EDT, 8 September 2023 | Updated: 08:13 EDT, 8 September 2023

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President Joe Biden departed Thursday for the G20 Leaders‘ Summit in New Delhi, India after days of speculation over whether the president would catch COVID-19 from his wife and scrap the trip. 

The maskless commander-in-chief didn’t take questions from the press as he boarded Air Force One through the smaller steps.

His trip begins just 24 hours after the Department of Justice warned they would seek to indict his son Hunter on gun charges by the end of the month, and he faced criticism from 9/11 families for marking Monday’s 22nd anniversary of the attacks in Alaska.

And more poll results released by CNN on Thursday morning show the majority of voters – including Democrats – think he is too old to run, and he is neck-and neck with Donald Trump.

While press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Wednesday that there were no ‘contingency plans’ being made if Biden had to skip, the White House didn’t reveal too much of Biden’s schedule either. 

He’s expected to meet with the G20’s host, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, after Air Force One lands Friday and then attend G20 sessions Saturday and Sunday before jetting off to Vietnam. 

National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan wouldn’t say Tuesday if Biden planned to hold bilateral meetings with two of the most controversial leaders expected to attend –  Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is skipping the meeting of the world’s richest economies amid the Ukraine invasion – sending Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in his stead – while Chinese President Xi Jinping is sitting the summit out amid tensions with host country India. 

Last week, China and India got into a diplomatic tiff over an ‘official map’ released by China that claimed lands along the Himalayas that Indian officials say belong to them. 

Xi is sending Premier Li Qiang in his place, Beijing announced Monday. 

At the briefing Tuesday, Sullivan encouraged the Chinese delegation to still play ball, despite Xi’s summit snub.

‘As far as the question of tensions between India and China affecting the summit: Really, that’s up to China,’ Sullivan said. ‘If China wants to come in and play the role of spoiler, of course, that option is available to them.’ 

Sullivan encouraged the Chinese to come to the summit ‘in a constructive way’ and work with other nations on the issues of ‘climate, on multilateral development bank reform, on debt relief, on technology’ and ‘set aside the geopolitical questions.’ 

One of the top summit agenda items for the U.S. is World Bank reform, scaling up the lender to provide funds for climate and infrastructure projects.

This move is strategic in that it could move some developing economies toward Western nations and away from the Chinese Communist Party’s lending practices, which the White House called ‘coercive and unsustainable’ when asking Congress in late August for $3.3 billion in additional funding. 

At the G7 in May in Hiroshima, Japan, some of the planned topics of discussion were overshadowed by the Ukraine war. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made a surprise visit to the summit, meeting with Biden and the other leaders of the top industrialized nations. 

The dynamic will be slightly different at the G20 – in part because Zelensky wasn’t invited by India. 

India has not condemned the Ukraine war as harshly as the United States and its top allies, as Russia is an important trading partner, though Modi did meet with Zelensky on the sidelines of the G7 in Japan. 

Also while Russia was expelled from the then-G8 in March 2014 after the annexation of Crimea, territory previously held by Ukraine, it remains a member of the G20.

Lavrov will be filling in for Putin during this weekend’s Leaders’ Summit, as the Russian leader hasn’t traveled outside the country since the International Criminal Court in March issued a warrant for his arrest over war crimes, including the removal of Ukrainian children to Russia. 

Lavrov has been on a world tour this week, appearing at the ASEAN summit in Jakarta, Indonesia – which was also attended by Vice President Kamala Harris. 

Sullivan predicted there would be a ‘continued focus on how the G20 deals with Russia’s illegal and ongoing war in Ukraine.’ 

‘The reality is that Russia’s illegal war has had devastating social and economic consequences, and the poorest counties on the planet are bearing the brunt of that,’ Sullivan pointed out. 

No major headway is expected from the full G20, with Lavrov on Friday already saying that Russia would block the final declaration from the summit if it didn’t reflect Moscow’s views on Ukraine. 

Meanwhile Secretary of State Antony Blinken made a surprise trip to Kyiv earlier this week.  

With Putin and Xi skipping the G20, no meeting of Biden’s will be more closely watched than if he decides to sit down with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on the sidelines of the summit.

Late last month, Axios reported that Biden was considering meeting with MBS, according to four sources in the know. 

Sullivan wouldn’t cement anything when asked about MBS – and Erdoğan – on Tuesday. 

‘I’m not going to speak to how the schedule will shape up over the course of the coming days,’ the national security adviser said. 

Sullivan said there was a ‘certain dynamic element’ to G20 scheduling, meaning that some of the meetings ‘will likely be announced at the last minute.’ 

‘And we will do our darndest to make sure that they are done in a way where the U.S. press has the ability to participate in them,’ he told the reporters in the briefing room. 

On the table, potentially, is a ‘mega-deal’ between Saudi Arabia and the U.S. that could lead to Saudi and Israel normalizing relations. 

It would be a historic breakthrough for Mideast peace. 

Officials told Axios that the administration is trying to finish its diplomatic push before the 2024 presidential election ramps up. 

While those sources pointed to how much of Biden’s time his reelection campaign will eat up, Saudi relations are not popular among swaths of the U.S. 

Besides the country’s poor treatment of women, there was the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. 

And timing of an MBS meeting could also be awkward for Biden – who has decided to skip the traditional 9/11 ceremonies to mark the anniversary of the terror attacks Monday in Alaska on his way home from India and Vietnam. 

For years, 9/11 families have gone after the Saudi government, as 15 of the 19 terrorist hijackers were Saudis. 

Turkey’s President Erdogan ‘declares war’ with Russia thanks to an interpreter’s blunder in front of a surprised Vladimir Putin

By Will Stewart

Updated: 12:06 EDT, 4 September 2023

Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declared victory and thanked his supporters in a speech as polls suggest it is likely the autocrat will cling onto power for a third decade. 

While the official result is yet to be declared, polls from pro and opposition agencies alike place the president in the lead against his secular opposition rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu. 

Those across Turkey await the result of the close presidential runoff that will likely see Erdogan extend his dominant yet divisive rule into a third decade.

With three quarters of the votes in, Erdogan remains ahead at 52.4 per cent with Kilicdaroglu at 46.6 per cent of the vote share. 

In his first comments since the polls close, Erdogan thanked his supporters in Istanbul for entrusting him with the ‘responsibility to govern this country once again for the upcoming five years’.

He ridiculed his opposition for his loss shouting ‘bye bye bye, Kemal’ as his supporters booed and told the crowd ‘the only winner today is Turkey’. 

While the official vote is yet to be declared, world leaders, from Qatar, Libya and Azerbaijan, have already congratulated Erdogan on his ‘victory’.

Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani has already congratulated Turkey’s president on winning the election – even though the result is yet to be announced. In a tweet, the Emir wished Erdogan success in his new term.

Erdogan, 69, defied opinion polls and came out comfortably ahead with an almost five-point lead over his rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu in the first round on May 14. 

But he fell just short of the 50 per cent needed to avoid a runoff, in a race with profound consequences for Turkey itself and global geopolitics.

Speaking ahead of the election result announcement, Erdogan spoke to his supporters on a campaign bus outside his home in Istanbul. 

He preemptively thanked his supporters and told them ‘we are together until the grave’.

He said: ‘God willing, I will be worthy of your trust just like I have been for the last 21 years.

‘I had said before the election this love does not end here.’

His unexpectedly strong showing amid a deep cost of living crisis, and a win in parliamentary elections for a coalition of his conservative Islamist-rooted AK Party (AKP), the nationalist MHP and others, buoyed the veteran campaigner who says a vote for him is a vote for stability. 

Erdogan, who has been at Turkey’s helm for 20 years, is favoured to win a new five-year term.

The election will decide not only who leads Turkey, a NATO-member country of 85million, but also how it is governed, where its economy is headed after its currency plunged to one tenth of its value against the dollar in a decade, and the shape of its foreign policy, which has seen Turkey irk the West by cultivating ties with Russia and Gulf states.

More than 64 million people are eligible to cast ballots, with preliminary results expected within hours of the polls closing at 5pm local time today. The outcome could have implications far beyond Ankara with Turkey playing a key role in Nato.

The May 14 election – the first time Erdogan did not win outright – saw an 87 per cent turnout, and strong participation is expected again today.  

Kilicdaroglu cobbled together a powerful coalition of Erdogan’s disenchanted former allies with secular nationalists and religious conservatives.

Opposition supporters viewed it as a do-or-die chance to save Turkey from being turned into an autocracy by a leader whose consolidation of power rivals that of Ottoman sultans.

Kilicdaroglu said after casting his vote in the first round: ‘I invite all my citizens to cast their ballot in order to get rid of this authoritarian regime and bring true freedom and democracy to this country.’ 

But Erdogan still managed to come within a fraction of a percentage point of winning outright in the first round.

In the first round of voting on May 14, Erdogan got 49.5 per cent support. Kilicdaroglu received 44.9 oer cent support. Nationalist candidate Sinan Ogan came third with 5.2 per cent support and was eliminated. The outcome confounded the expectations of pollsters who had put Kilicdaroglu ahead.

Should he win today, Erdogan would remain in power until 2028, and is likely to push Turkey down an increasingly authoritarian path through his muscular foreign policy and unorthodox economic governance. 

After three stints as prime minister and two as president, the devout Muslim who heads the conservative and religious Justice and Development Party, or AKP, is already Turkey’s longest-serving leader. 

Erdogan’s success came in the face of one of the world’s worst cost-of-living crises, with almost every opinion poll predicting his defeat.

Waiting outside an Istanbul polling station on Sunday, 93-year-old Ozer Atayolu told AFP he always arrived first to vote ‘because I believe in democracy and my responsibility as a citizen’. 

‘I feel like a child having fun,’ the retired textile engineer said.

Some opposition supporters, however, sounded defeated as they emerged from the polls.

Bayram Ali Yuce said in one of Istanbul’s heavily anti-Erdogan neighbourhoods said: ‘Today is not like the last time. I was more excited then.

‘The outcome seems more obvious now. But I still voted.’

Kilicdaroglu tried his best to keep his disappointed supporters’ spirits up.

‘Do not despair,’ he said on Twitter after the vote. But he then vanished from view for four days before re-emerging a transformed man.

The former civil servant’s old message of social unity and democracy gave way to desk-thumping speeches about the need to immediately expel migrants and fight terrorism.

His right-wing turn was targeted at nationalists who emerged as the big winners of the parallel parliamentary elections.

The 74-year-old had always adhered to the firm nationalist principles of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the military commander who formed both Turkey and Kilicdaroglu’s secular CHP party.

But these had played a secondary role to his promotion of socially liberal values practised by younger voters and big-city residents.

Analysts question whether Kilicdaroglu’s gamble will work.

His informal alliance with a pro-Kurdish party left him exposed to charges from Erdogan of working with ‘terrorists’.

The government portrays the Kurdish party as the political wing of outlawed militants.

And Kilicdaroglu’s courtship of Turkey’s hard right was hampered by the endorsement Erdogan received from an ultra-nationalist who finished third two weeks ago.

The political battles are being watched closely across world capitals because of Turkey’s footprint in both Europe and the Middle East.

Erdogan’s warm ties with the West during his first decade in power were followed by a second in which he turned Turkey into NATO’s problem child.

He launched a series of military incursions into Syria that infuriated European powers and put Turkish soldiers on the opposite side of Kurdish forces supported by the United States.

His personal relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin has also survived the Kremlin’s war on Ukraine despite Western sanctions against Moscow.

Turkey’s troubled economy is benefiting from a crucial deferment of payment on Russian energy imports, which helped Erdogan spend lavishly on campaign pledges this year.

Erdogan also delayed Finland’s membership of NATO and is still refusing to let Sweden join the US-led defence bloc.

The Eurasia Group consultancy said Erdogan was likely to continue trying to play world powers off each other should he win.

‘Turkey’s relations with the US and the EU will remain transactional and tense,’ it said.

Turkey’s unravelling economy will pose the most immediate test for whoever wins the vote.

Erdogan went through a series of central bankers until he found one who started enacting his wish to slash interest rates at all costs in 2021 – flouting the rules of conventional economics in the belief that lower rates can cure chronically high inflation.

Turkey’s currency soon entered a freefall and the annual inflation rate touched 85 percent last year.

Erdogan has promised to continue these policies, despite predictions of economic peril from analysts.

Turkey burned through tens of billions of dollars while trying to support the lira from politically sensitive falls ahead of the vote.

Many analysts say that Turkey must now either hike interest rates or abandon its attempts to support the lira – two solutions that would incur economic pain.

‘The day of reckoning for Turkey’s economy and financial markets may now just be around the corner,’ analysts at Capital Economics warned.