Awkward relations
The American president and the Saudi king will have an unusually edgy meeting
BARACK OBAMA may recall a tricky moment when he first met King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia five years ago. Bending to shake hands with the octogenarian monarch, the taller American appeared to bow deeply. Republican snipers in America gleefully blasted the president for “kowtowing” to rich Arabs. Such protocols should run more smoothly when Mr Obama heads to Saudi Arabia on March 28th for his second time in office. Unfortunately, however, relations between the two countries have seldom been more awkward.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “Awkward relations”
From the March 29th 2014 edition
Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents
Explore the edition
Meet Ibrahim Traoré, Burkina Faso’s retro revolutionary
Africa’s youngest leader is the face of the continent’s changing geopolitics
Israel is intent on destroying Gaza
Without pressure from America, it is hard to see anything stopping it
Trump rebuffs Netanyahu and gambles on a deal with Iran
Israel’s prime minister tied his country’s fate to Donald Trump. Now America is talking to its enemy
Turkey and Israel are becoming deadly rivals in Syria
The Middle East’s beefiest powers are playing out their regional ambitions there
America steps up bombing the Houthis but lacks a clear strategy
It will be hard to secure the Red Sea without driving the rebel group from power in Yemen
Talks over the Chagos Islands show the rising clout of Mauritius
And the influence of India, which is building facilities on another Mauritian island