France, Saudi Arabia sign multiple contracts worth $18bn
France has managed to sign 20 major agreements with Saudi Arabia worth $18 billion, sources have revealed at the end of a trip by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to Paris.
Al ArabiyaTV, a channel run by the Saudi government, said Tuesday that the agreements covered various economic fields, without elaborating whether they were full contracts or memorandums of understanding.
The mega deals come at the end of a trip by bin Salman to France, a country he has managed to build close relations with over the past years. Earlier reports had suggested that the bulk of the deals, around $10 billion, were related to cooperation in the oil sector between the state oil giant Saudi Aramco on one side and major French companies including Total, Technip and Suez, on the other.
Other reports on Tuesday suggested some of the major deals signed during Salman’s current visit were for arms sale, including a deal for navy patrol boats from French company CMN and another one for Caesar artillery canons from Nexter. The French presidency has played down a possible contract while the two companies in question have also refused to comment.
The French companies have always been among the main suppliers of modern weaponry to Saudi Arabia and Paris has already reached military deals worth around 20 billion with the Saudis.
Most of those weapons have been used in Saudi Arabia’s more than three years of war on its southern neighbor Yemen. Rights groups have repeatedly called on Paris to stop the provision of arms and instead impose pressure on Saudis to stop the carnage which has left more than 14,000 people, mostly civilians, killed since the war started in March 2015. As part of the increasing arms sale, Riyadh has been procured with French tanks, armored vehicles, munitions and artillery and navy ships over the past years.
Reports on Sunday said France and Saudi Arabia had reached an agreement on a new intergovernmental accord to conclude weapons deals. French authorities said the new mechanism was devised to appease bin Salman who was critical of the way the military contracts had been reached and implemented.
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