Miteb Bin Abdullah: US visit

King Abdullah’s son, minister of the National Guard Prince Miteb Bin Abdullah Bin Abdelaziz, left for the US on 18 November, on an official visit at the invitation of defence secretary Chuck Hagel (who resigned under pressure on 24 November). The Saudis played up the importance of the visit; state news agency SPA put out a lengthy statement detailing the history of US-Saudi relations, which it says date back to the early 1930s, when Ibn Saud granted a US company (Standard Oil of California) the right to explore for oil.