Saudi Arabia: French weapons deal

Saudi Arabia and France have sealed a previously agreed deal for Riyadh to buy $3bn worth of French weapons for the Lebanese Army. The deal, signed on 4 November by Saudi finance minister Ibrahim Al-Assaf and Edouard Guillard, the chairman of ODAS (a company set up by the French government and defence contractors to promote defence sales), was announced in late December 2013, after French President François Hollande visited Saudi Arabia. French news agency AFP quoted a French source as saying the contract had gone through months of negotiations over which weapons would be supplied, and that it would now be “rapidly implemented”.