the lights are on. and there's nowhere to hide do you think we're going to see some kind of scene change in the u.s. relationship with saudi arabia i haven't said it's a right wing conspiracy or anybody's conspiracy up front on al-jazeera. u.s. media report the cia has concluded the saudi crown prince ordered the killing of jamal khashoggi. prayers held for the journalist and writer in front of an empty space where his coffin should lie. peter w. watching al-jazeera live from doha also coming up. this is

a crucial moment for yemen. the u.n. says the warring sides in the yemeni conflict are ready to go back to the negotiating table. and a summit for dialogue turns into a war of words between the u.s. and china will be live at the apec meeting in papua new guinea. the. us media is reporting that the cia has concluded the saudi crown prince mohammed bin cell man ordered the killing of jamal khashoggi last month this includes reports of a phone call that the prince's brother. who's also the saudi ambassador to the u.s. had with guaranteeing his safety if he went to the saudi consulate in istanbul mike hanna has more now from washington. in recent days a number of members of congress have demanded that muhammad have been silent be

held accountable either by way of tweets or in the case of senator bob corker during a debate about yemen in the senate i asked for our level briefing with matters pompei zero and your house for the comment assumes we get back to share with us what is happening with saudi arabia on both fronts both yemen and what is happening as it relates to the journalist who was assassinated in my opinion at the graduation of the crown prince of saudi arabia us now the washington post reports the cia has concluded that the saudi crown prince ordered the assassination of journalist jamal khashoggi the sit says according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity the report says in reaching his conclusions the cia examined multiple sources of intelligence including a phone call that the crown prince's brother and ambassador to the u.s. had with the journalist before his murder khaled bin solomon was quick to deny the

allegation saying on twitter i never talked to him by phone and certainly never suggested he go to turkey for any reason i asked the u.s. government to release any information regarding this claim. within hours several of the news organizations including the new york times and the wall street journal were also quoting anonymous officials confirming the report of the cia's finding although it is very important it's very significant. what the washington post new york times. c m b c n n other outlets over the hours. reported that the cia internal assessment now is pointing straight years. in so much as having ordered this operation this has never happened before at the cia we probably will not comment on this kind of report however the washington

post wouldn't report this unless they were accurately reporting what they believe the cia said so which is a slight nuance now one can anticipate that the congressional oversight committees will have been briefed or demand to be briefed on this the reports alleging muhammad have been solomon's involvement unlikely to field even further congressional demands that punitive measures be taken against the crown prince and his government the question is whether the president has been briefed by the cia on its reported conclusions and if so whether he would be prepared to back away from his stated reluctance to take action against the saudi government and its leader as i cannot al-jazeera washington. to the center of the story istanbul and our correspondent andrew symonds andrew any reaction there any more leaks there in

turkey this morning. and so it's a reaction nothing big gets certainly the media has responded with headlines such as shocking however in the intelligence community and indeed the investigation team here you can be sure there isn't a lot of surprise at the content of the washington post report but perhaps surprised at its timing now the president the turkish president regime. is june to make a public appearance later on today saturday and we expect probably some reference to the latest on the investigation. that has not spoken this week publicly since he met the at the u.s. president donald trump a week ago now that apart from

a briefing in which he asserted that he would stand solid on its obligations against the saudi arabian investigation saying it's inadequate and it's really a whitewash effectively no direct would about mohammed bin solomon the question is whether there will be any direct word about him today from the turkish president but he did have a conversation with donald trump on friday nights and in that conversation according to some background reports we have from the presidency they spoke about shedding light on all aspects of the case and a need to prevent a whitewash now but cirqus making an emphasis on that need to prevent a whitewash this conversation took place before the washington post news broke and after a day of prayer as right across the world the main ones here in istanbul. forty

five days of the jamal khashoggi is murder they come to pray. with a grief that permeates a gray rainy day. abound all the more poignant because of the empty space of the most solid stone here where a coffin should rest one of the show jews friends set the tone of the day after this prayer we are going to look for. justice not anger. but deep grief but we are looking consistently justice for. another friend expressed similar sentiment in bottom of the sun by us into this was a barbaric act committed in the twenty first century this wasn't just the murder. expressions of anguish of regret and the quest for justice amongst little more

revelations from a turkish media about the last moments of jamal khashoggi is life events that dispute the saudi account of what happened. took his harriet newspaper says a so far on the hood of odia recording disproves the saudi assertion that jews murdered was not planned the newspaper says the team can be heard discussing how to kill him the audio apparently contradicts the latest version of events from the saudis who are only twenty four hours ago said he died after being injected with a large dose of sedative following a brawl. and turkish investigators say it's already been established from the original recording that close shoji was strangled to death a not drugged a ruling party official who knew well says the saudi investigation can't be credible. it's an investigation that is headed by the crown prince and that

investigation says he isn't related to what happened in each one organization of this investigation is problematic you can expect an independent fair judgment from that court among those here were many who didn't know because shoji who was murdered in their tragic way unfortunately so that's why i'm here today it's really symbolic for me to see this prayer. that is impossible not to react as a muslim and the human being we are here to do our duty for jamal khashoggi. loved ones who maintain privacy on this day maybe some level of comfort spiritually but closure seems a long distance away. where do the turkish authorities go with this information ok andrew the united states in effect is now saying we believe the order for this was given at the highest possible level in riyadh so what the consequences of that now

potentially go where. well the consequences really stay in the united states right now with donald trump what action will he take of because everyone's waiting to see what he's going to do congress is putting pressure on now the cia is evidently briefing in many places against trump's wishes maybe there are many aspects to the situation involving how how i've been solomon will figure in all of this he's denied point blank that he actually did make the phone call a two kushal jeep here in turkey we have no feed from the turkish investigation teams about how had been solomon's involvement is the younger brother of mohammed bin salmon the crown prince he has had a lot of support work engaged in the united states to effectively launch have

been sound man there ahead of his moving into his present role his reforms the whole sequence of events but coming back to the trail the trial if as is alleged he did give an assurance of safety to crucial g. and we have no reason to to to actually back that up here on the ground at this stage then that would have taken place sometime in september or when all investigations show there had been an order to go out and and certainly kill because shoghi at that stage now it was september the twenty eight's that because shoji first came to the consulate to inquire about a papers he needed about his marital status in order to get married in the coming days to his fiance now further on from that we know that the turkish

investigation team were already on the case they had intelligence operatives trailing an agent from saudi or. who was involved in suspicious activity that's the term used and we know that he was engaged in driving around looking at certain locations and we've got we've i have seen evidence of this i've seen the pictures the surveillance shots so there was something going on always through him but as far as how they have been solomon is concerned that whether or not he did that she's sort of set up this situation by making the phone call we don't have proof but the washington post certainly seems to have got proof from a cia possibly taps phone taps whatever but it is firmly denied by bin salman himself as far as the tapes mentioned in the area newspaper are concerned they relate to dismissing the claim that this was really an accident some sort of accident that it was not premeditated murder no that's hate the new sank show you

can air on it according to the transcripts that this took place before we we had the arrival of at the consulate and the team what together and they were discussing how they were going to murder jamal not just you know how they were going to actually try to persuade him to go back to saudi arabia which if you believe the saudi arabian latest story then that's what they were meant to do no not at all it was a premeditated murder according to the turks and it would seem that all accounts that the saudis have given so far very just spewed they they are disputed by the turks and that don't just don't seem credible to the turkish investigates is so where do we go from here was that what happens next maybe it into international investigation could be that way or a joint u.s. turkey investigation involving the cia the f.b.i.

whatever there is no there's no to easy answer to your question peter but the bottom line is the. this has escalated so dramatically now this is really a thunderbolt in terms of news and in terms of confirming this is specious of so many people in this investigation to andrew thanks very much ok let's stay with this breaking aspect of the the aftermath of the death of jamal khashoggi we are told now to evan resnick he's a u.s. foreign policy and security specialist at the s. rajaratnam school of international studies joining us from singapore and interesting just to be clear here this is based on a list a raft of hard data this is actual tapes this is not even jeanne a house bill interprete ing from the cia interpret in for donald trump or she heard during that six or seven hour conversation she had in turkey this is tapes this is data that they are reacting to sure this is. only

credible signals intelligence that basically reconfirms what most of us already suspected as your correspondent mentioned that there is this plot this assassination goes right to the top of the saudi regime the crown prince and this is also originating with the united states this is u.s. intel intercepts a conversation very specifically between the crown prince and his brother and that's the conversation that jamal khashoggi had with somebody in washington where that somebody said look go to istanbul you'll be safe we can guarantee it. sure it's again it is it's explosive. intelligence and it once again just points us in the same direction we already were the question is how credible will the president of the united states see this evidence that's really the pertinent question here and especially given president trump's proclivity towards the saudi regime towards and mohamed been some on even his long running skepticism

of the u.s. have his own intelligence community it's an open question how seriously he will take this intelligence even if all the rest of us take it quite seriously does he not want to take it very seriously. clearly he has many many reasons to want to whitewash this case this is a problem for him not least of which is the problem that this case poses for his regional policy which is a net containing. the islamic republic of iran. so it's all about containing iran and saudi arabia is the linchpin for that policy and also has a he has a strong head on the odd but nevertheless strong affinity for the saudi regime his son in law's great post of m.b. s. so there are all sorts of overlapping geopolitical urson all. reasons for trump to want to do everything he can to try and whitewash this evan resident used the word

there whitewash that's pretty strong language is the plan b. for getting that in a straight just interrupt you for a second is the plan b. for the trumpet ministration there is no plan b. it wouldn't be the first time in american history that a administration that has tried whitewashed embarrassing human rights abuses committed by u.s. allies the case of the soviet behavior in the cats in forest in one nine hundred forty during world war two comes to mind but this is yeah this is a case where yet again where sort of an allied b.s. of the united states there's something very embarrassing and the white house has very strong reasons to want to dismiss discounts devalue and ultimately nor what is some pretty horrific behavior five of the eleven accused in saudi arabia are imminently facing the death penalty as far as riyadh's concerned do they want to

carry out the death penalty's with those five individuals and then see that as an end to this affair. i think so this is in the case of the government in riyadh they want it they want this this case to go away as quickly as possible probably of even even more badly than the top administration does. so the saudi the prosecutor has read the rest of twenty one suspects this prosecutor seeking the death penalty for five mi mi in the meantime the u.s. treasury department has imposed sanctions on them under the global magnitsky act on seventeen saudis and i think the hope in both riyadh and washington or least in both riyadh and the white house is that this is enough the sorts of piecemeal. action will be enough to kind of paper over this standoff ok this is clearly and will continue to be

a multi country multi agency investigation about the turks the saudis the cia the united states the europeans does anyone anyone any place have true confidence in the saudi part of the inquiry the investigation into what happened between september the twenty eighth and october the second when the man we're now looking at on our screen walked into the saudi consulate to get some paperwork because he was planning on getting remarried within hours. my guess is there are very few learned that observers anywhere in capitals major powers anywhere around the world that actually. believe what the saudis are what saudi government is saying that i'm who knows what the what president trump and his senior advisers will leave my guess is that even they are probably. a baby they probably understands that this is the evidence as it is seriously. strong extremely strong that m.b.a.'s that senior saudi leaders were involved in this nation so i

can imagine there are very few people around the world outside of saudi arabia that actually. the saudis have sent evidence nic thank you so much for your time joining us there from singapore. still to come here on al-jazeera the death toll continues to rise in california as a grapples with the worst wildfires the state has a hat. and a heavy loss historians of the kilogram weigh in on house replace the grand casey as it were talking heads into storage. senator robert kennedy was assassinated in june one thousand nine hundred eighty. cents or had this to serving a life sentence for his murder. but there have been calls for decades for the case to be reopened including from robert kennedy jr. all the evidence was destroyed

after the trial they had a legal obligation to say the evidence because so our hand was going to file an appeal al-jazeera world asks who killed robert kennedy. welcome back welcome if you're just joining us my name's peter w. watching al-jazeera your headlines u.s. media reporting this hour the cia has now concluded the saudi crown prince mohammed bin did order the killing of. the washington post newspaper is reporting the saudi ambassador to the u.s. told her he'd be safe if he went to the consulate but the ambassador denies this conversation ever took place. prayers are taking place around the world for jamal

khashoggi people have been gathering at mosques in indonesia turkey saudi arabia and the u.k. . the u.n. special envoy to yemen mohsin griffiths says the warring parties and the forthcoming peace talks in sweden who fights civilians schools and hospitals in the port city of data were hit in the latest by the saudi led coalition it is a crucial moment for yemen i've received firm assurances from the leadership of the yemeni parties the governor government of course first and then they are committed to attending these consultations i believe that genuine alike spec them to continue in that way and to. for those consultations and indeed so do the yemeni people who are desperate for a political solution to a war in which they are the main victims you see rebels say at least six people were killed on friday. from neighboring djibouti. fulfill fishelson for the dot com

farm up fighting has resumed in the city they are calling a ceasefire. by the sodium or arctic or lucian nothing short of a tactic to regroup they say the pro-government forces have been getting grain foresman from other parts of the country in the past forty eight hours they're also spoke of air strikes that killed up to six civilians on friday in the day that of course the whole thing also admitting that they've continued their operation against the pro-government forces saying they have been targeting positions around the outskirts of the city belonging to the pro-government fighters meanwhile the international committee of the red cross has issued a statement calling for more discipline among the combatants in and around the day that they say before we talk about peace we need to talk about the enforcement of

international law the whole thing of targeting of civilian areas and also respecting places like hospitals and schools the international red cross also called for the respect of the center of civilian lives in the war in yemen. to the states because at least seventy one people are confirmed in california after the u.s. states worst wildfire on record more than one thousand others are missing rob reynolds with the latest. climate change has come to california severe drought and santa ana winds a simple so far launches two fires that still have not been stopped the wind fueled flames moved so fast many had to drive through the fire to get out. this driver survived but many more did not trapped in traffic with the fire moving faster than they could an untold number have died calling for help that couldn't

get there in time the number of people who are still looking for or and counting for has increased to six hundred thirty one and this number increased by five hundred one people now hundreds of volunteers are doing disc gruesome work looking for the remains of those who couldn't make it out but experts say it's possible many will never be found my colleagues are finding profoundly degraded human remains the term of art they use is creamy which is the consequence of combustion at high temperature for the thousands who escaped now a waiting game of wonder and worry did their houses survive how are their neighbors and where will they go now in a state already dealing with a severe shortage of housing thick blankets of smoke made air quality hazardous in cities like san francisco and sacramento

a changing climate and more severe wildfires what california governor jerry brown calls the new abnormal rob reynolds al-jazeera. an argentine submarines been found up to being missing for more than a year the sun has been located by a continuous navy in what was eight hundred meters deep in the south atlantic the vessel disappeared on the bottom of the fifteenth of last year with forty four service men on board. the chinese president xi jinping says world growth is being overshadowed by protectionism speaking at the apec summit in popping new guinea he referred to u.s. china trade tensions calling protectionist actions quote shortsighted and doomed to fail so paul. resorting to old practices such as protectionism unilateral ism will not resolve problems but also adds the uncertainties to the global economy and history tells us taking that road of confrontation whether in the form of a cold war open war or trade war will produce no win it. we have great respect for

president. and great respect for china but in the president's words china is taking advantage of the united states for many many years. in those days are over. as the president said and china has tremendous barriers they have tremendous tariffs in as we all know their country and gauges and quotas force technology transfers you know actual property thirty industrial subsidies on an unprecedented scale now to europe britain has a new brics that secretary as the prime minister series in may face to save a draft withdrawal agreement struck with the rest of the e.u. he's stephen bartley he steps in to the position be catered by dominic robb one of a number of conservatives who quits after the tory cabinet backed the deal this is made to complain to the public on friday speaking on a radio station in london to try and sell the agreement but a number of her party senior lawmakers say the agreement will be rejected when it goes back to parliament. scientists from sixteen nations have gathered in france

and cheated after making a landmark decision to overhaul the way a kilogram is assessed and barker reports now from about what this could all mean were really they are the masters of measurements custodians of the kilogram the international general conference some weight some measurements is gathered to vote a redefining of vital calculation since eight hundred eighty nine the kilograms been based on this cylinder of polish platinum alloy the chunk of metal known as look grown k. is so precious it's kept deep in a high security vaults near paris. it is the mother of all measurements from which all weighing scales everywhere in the world a calibrated but there's a problem the growing case losing weight over the past one hundred twenty nine years of interacting with the air around it not to mention the occasional polish it's lost atoms fifty micrograms of mass to be precise it's just an object

so if you use it you have to use it very carefully even when you put it on a balance you might change its mass a little bit it's not it's not guaranteed to be stable you have to keep it under the best condition as you and it is a replica of the gronk a otherwise known as the international kilogram prototype copies like this a calibrated against the original roughly every forty years or so increasing the possibility of inaccuracy that's unlikely to matter much when you're mixing ingredients together for a cake or measuring apples in the supermarket when you're mixing chemicals or putting together the ingredients in sensitive pharmaceuticals hyper accuracy matters. so what will replace le grande k. is the new standard kilogram the answer lies in quantum physics obviously the kilogram will be based on a universal constant to nature such as gravity or the speed of light is called the

planck constant very simply it describes the behavior of particles and waves in the atomic scale and is measured using a complex instrument known as the kibble balance as it were is shifting today to this. era which means that now we are in. a world into a lot of technology which are based on that and the need to have units which are you know i create a. decision look wrong k. will now retire into storage a relic of a bygone age ensuring a kilogram remains a kilogram for all time and for all people needs barca al-jazeera france. this is al-jazeera these are the top stories u.s. media are reporting the cia has concluded the saudi crown prince mohammed bin cell man did order the killing of jamal the washington post is reporting the saudi

ambassador to the u.s. told her he'd be safe to go to the consulate but the ambassador denies this conversation took place turkish media is also reporting there's another order you're recording related to the killing it reportedly captures a saudi teen discussing how to murder her before he entered the consulate in istanbul meanwhile prayers are taking place around the world for people who've been gathering at mosques in indonesia turkey saudi arabia and in the u.k. in other news the u.n. special envoy to yemen martin griffith says the warring parties will attend the forthcoming peace talks in sweden with the fighters civilian schools and hospitals in the port city of new data we're here to the latest airstrikes by the saudi led coalition. this is a crucial moment for yemen i've received firm assurances from the leadership of the yemeni parties the governor yemen of course first and then they are committed to attending these consultations i believe that genuine unlike spec them to continue

in that way and to. appear for those consultations and indeed so do the yemeni people who are desperate for a political solution to a war in which they are the main victims of the apec summit has seen a war of words between china and the us as trade tensions rise the chinese president xi jinping said world growth is being overshadowed by protectionism but u.s. vice president mike pence responded saying tariffs on china will state until it ends what he called unfair trade practices the number of people reportedly missing from the wildfires in northern california has jumped now to more than one thousand the region sheriff says an estimated one thousand and eleven people on accounted for the authorities have recovered the remains of eight more victims brings the death toll to seventy one. last more news on the web site al-jazeera dot com is the address you need up next it's up front of the up front and back with thirty minutes

of we'll see that. for you. today on up front is it time to log off from an increasingly scandal plagued facebook iconic tech pioneer jaron lanier and is the crown prince of saudi arabia really going to execute the country's most famous cleric. i made the house and we've all heard about the saudi crown prince is alleged involvement in the murder of a saudi journalist but what about the clerics and activists he's rounded up at home

i'll speak to the son of imprisoned saudi shake someone out up but first with facebook in the news again for failing to grapple with russian meddling illegal data sharing and hate speech is it time to just log off the author of the recent book ten arguments for deleting your social media account right now certainly think so this week's headlines from new york all for virtual reality pioneer and iconic computer scientist jaron lanier. jaron lanier thanks for joining me from the new york times just published a bombshell report revealing that facebook knew about russian meddling in the u.s. elections failed to penalize then presidential candidate donald trump for posting racist content compromised its users data privacy and tried to smear its critics as anti semites to quote from the times headline facebook strategy was to delay deny and deflect you know facebook i'm sure you've probably interacted with mark zuckerberg does any of that surprise you what's your reaction to this report. well

. i'm not entirely surprised by the reporter though some of the details are surprising and shocking i think from the facebook point of view and from zucker brooks point of view he is ollie's in what he perceives as a life or death struggle either facebook controls the world or it dies he doesn't perceive any kind in. tween outcome and so therefore there's a kind of an ethic of anything at all is allowed because it's either survival or total domination or total death and so if you perceive this all or nothing world which i think is a false perception then you lose all sense of proportion obviously and given the crises plaguing facebook which go back to the twenty sixteen us election and beyond zuckerberg the chair and c.e.o. and sheryl sandberg the c.e.o. are they still the right people to be running facebook right now or is it time for them to step aside well one of the peculiarities of facebook is that it's the

only public corporation that's large and is effectively controlled by one person and it's in a sense that's an oxymoron a public corporation should have a powerful board it should have power powerful shareholders and the fact that there isn't governance is the first issue that it's a one man shop is really really not ok it's not ok for the world it's not even in the spirit of capitalism i think it's really anti market it's anti-democratic so you should study the side and make it more democratic and capitalist i think it would be good for the world if he stepped aside but the point is that there's no mechanism for him to do so. yeah last year mark zuckerberg said facebook's mission is to give people the power to build a community and bring the world closer together given these recent revelations given your own research in this field do you buy that. well you know from my perspective having participated in the creation of the internet in the first place

it's the internet that brought people together and yet whenever facebook shows up somewhere it seems to incite intercommunal bloodshed because the very way it functions is by grabbing people's emotions and the easiest ones to grab are the negative ones the fight or flight emotions and so it tends to reach passions and then put those reste passions into the cycle until they become ever worse and then you start to have the routing here crisis crises in south india crises in rural africa so we see bizarre. powers coming coming into play that are displacing democracy in countries as different as sweden and brazil what else do they have in common other than facebook that you know that that's all they have some of course in britain which is owned by facebook and it's interesting you raise the issue of the rohingya and the ethnic cleansing the new york times did draw attention to that in their piece and say facebook ignored people who warned them about ethnic cleansing and their role in it the twenty

sixteen election of course is really brought this argument to the fore about facebook's role in politics as it were there's been a lot of debate and controversy over facebook say these allegations are untrue they're inaccurate about their role in the elections or whether they knew about russian meddling etc do you believe there is evidence to suggest that facebook had a measurable impact on the outcome of the u.s. presidential election on the outcome of the brics referendum that actually change votes i i would say there's enough strong evidence and enough consensus of enough people with enough different well intentioned and well informed perspectives that we should finally to say what the american intelligence establishment has said and what many others have said is that yes yes facebook did change the outcome of the american election and facebook's property wazza did change the outcome of the brazilian election probably. played a role in bragg's it probably played a role in many other events in the world in recent years while and it's interesting

you say that the problem is much broader than facebook it's social media itself you say that there are ten arguments for deleting your social media accounts right now that's the title of your book so we don't have time to get into all ten what do you know top two arguments for why people watching to get off of social media. well i would say first of all there could be some good form of social media the problem with social media right now is that it's designed to manipulate you and so if you enjoy free will if you enjoy being an honest person in the world you should not be using present day social media the business model of face work in other companies like twitter is any time you connect with another person that's financed by some third party you don't know about who's trying to manipulate you in some sneaky way so it's this giant manipulation machine by design every penny they earn was earned because somebody thought they could manipulate somebody else another one is the tenth argument which is the spiritual one which is there's effectively

a new religion that's being promoted by facebook and some of the other tech companies which is that people are just information machines were modules and were all being connected together into a giant computer through these companies and this giant computer will be this super intelligent ai that will be better than humanity and will inherit the world and so it's essentially a new kind of religion and if you practice an existing religion or if you're an atheist whatever you are you're gradually being sucked into this other tech religion and it's a crappy religion i mean it's a silly religion and you might not be aware of it because it happens gradually and so i'd ask you to examine very carefully with your buying into this this bizarre new way of thinking and if you want to learn more about that you can find it in the book just to check jar and do you practice what you preach do you participate in any social media yourself oh god no i would never. if an accountant one of those things i do fine without any account on facebook or twitter or any of the rest of

them you actually don't disappear if you delete your accounts some people might say that if everybody in the arab world for example had listened to your advice in two thousand and ten two thousand and eleven and deleted their social media accounts we would have had some of the revolutions in the middle east we may not have the arab spring because in many ways those revolutions in egypt in tunisia they've been dubbed the facebook revolution the twitter revolution that's what they've been called yet so he hears what happens every time somebody uses platforms like facebook and twitter to effect. positive social change where they're saying well we can make our country better we can we can achieve this or that the algorithms in the background take whatever those people have done and they broadcast whatever information those people have given the text the images everything and they're looking for engagement from the broad population and what they do is they discover where the most engaged point is and the most engaging end is inevitably with those people who are inflamed by it and then those people who are angry and and irritated scared whatever the zoom in on them and then they'll incited incite it

introduce them to each other and then the whole tool will refine itself for the most engaging it which inevitably is with the people who are the most angry the most in secure the most jealous the most afraid and then it becomes a tool for those people and certainly what you have is to make it a recruitment tool for isis so you start with something that helps the arab spring you end up with something that's optimized for isis you say that these are not just social media companies they are behavior modification empires and that when he uses behavior is turned into an empire for rent a lot of people say you basically are questioning free will you're saying that we actually lost our ability to make free choices we've been so do you is there actual evidence for that because a lot of people say well actually no it's fashionable to say we're addicted we're not really addicted to social media research is that unicef research is oxford university said you know we're actually not addicted to social media in the way that you say we are in your book. well the last person who can recognize an

addiction is the addict right and so from a technical point of view social media addiction is similar to gambling addiction and if you've ever talked to somebody with a gambling addiction you'll see the same things are i'm not addicted i just know how to be lucky i have a system and it's a very similar process facebook's own published research that went through academic peer review shows that they can alter people's emotions so that the people understanding and being able to be consciously aware their face what did it to them there was a famous study in which they made masses of people sad without those people's consent and nobody understood that it was happening to them to say that you can be aware of that is a fool's game you cannot be we know that you cannot be and just to be clear of the five big tech companies google facebook amazon apple microsoft you say it's google and facebook that are doing the most damage to our behavior and our lifestyles not amazon which has been in the news this week for lots of criticism over the way it's

got money out of government apple microsoft you say it's google and facebook is that right. well look there are plenty of reasons to criticize microsoft and facebook and for full disclosure i have a relationship with microsoft now and for even full disclosure i've sold a company to google i actually really like big tech companies i'm not sort of anti-corporate or anti tech companies however what distinguishes google and facebook is that they rely almost solely on the manipulation machine for their money they don't have any diversification they're absolutely addicted to it like picture states are addicted to oil and so it does in my view corrupt them now the things i'm talking about these when appeal ations are all the tech companies engage in them to some degree but not totally so there might be additional reasons to criticize the other tech companies there probably are but it's where is this particular issue of running a mass mental manipulation machine for profit that's really google and facebook and

then. and you know you make me feel good or you make the argument very strongly in your book you're making the argument very eloquently today but do you worry that your connection to microsoft which you said full disclosure of being a research remarks didn't undermines your argument you're part of one of the quote unquote rivals your part one of the companies you're saying isn't as bad as google and facebook doesn't undermine you in some way. well i love silicon valley i'm a creature of it and i want us to be better and i feel that being a loyal opposition being able to say what we're doing is wrong we need to change is my d.d. . it's a it's a and i used to be rather lonely doing this there weren't too many others but in recent years it's actually become much more acceptable and common for people in the tech industry to criticize the tech industry and i think it's enormously healthy so . i don't think we should rely on people like me who are within the tech industry

to be the sole critics or the sole agents of change that would be a problem but i think it's crucial that there be people inside the industry willing to call the truth that i think it is. but as an industry insider as someone who was there for the start of the internet and you say you love silicon valley you want to see improve on the one hand some people say your supporters will say see even johnny is saying this and he was there from the beginning he's he knows it inside out others might say hold on that makes jaron lanier a hypocrite because he made his name in this field he made his money out of it and now he's criticizing everyone else who's still in the business you know i was one of the earlier people to criticize what we're doing i started writing critical essays about this i wrote an essay in ninety two saying if we keep on going what we're doing there might someday be these bots that would do battle with each other to influence people and could throw an election so i mean i think about this for a long time does it make me a hypocrite for sticking with it possibly but you know what if that's so use what i'm saying to your benefit see read the arguments if they're helpful if you find

any power from them use and i really don't like whether i'm like who cares if i'm a hypocrite i'm just one person and i'm not running for office i'm not asking you for anything what i can give you is a perspective that you won't get from many other places of how an inside. make these terrible mistakes. for you jeremy we'll have to leave it there thank you so much for joining me on outfront. thank you so much for having me. the new york times reported this week that shortly after journalist jamal khashoggi was assassinated in turkey a member of the saudi killed team instructed the superior over the phone to tell your boss but bosses believed to be saudi crown prince mohammed bin salam who back at home continues to crack down on his critics one such critic is the prominent muslim cleric. who's been held in solitary confinement for opposing the government and is now facing a possible death sentence joining me to discuss his situation is some abdullah

a louder a saudi citizen who is now living in the united states and fears returning he's a senior fellow at georgetown university center for muslim christian understanding . for joining me from boston the saudi authorities had your father in prison last year and charged with over thirty five different crimes including corrupting the land connection to a terrorist organization and offending patriotism what's your response to the saudi authorities and to those charges well it's the same operation are going on is going on actually for dissidents brode for those who disagree at home for journalists economists public figures in general so my response is that the charge is actually represent how the state would crack down on any different view and on any person who

disagrees and saudi prosecutors in september of this year called fuel for the execution to do you think they're serious about that that they would really execute a cleric as prominent as your father salma out well do you think those who went to the saudi consulate were so. to take the liar for the prominent journalist and veteran. it's i mean it's the same mentality it's a pattern it didn't it did not start with my father did not start with it's a pattern that we have is worth we have seen through the past twenty and a half since the crown prince came to power they did everything in their power to just silence others to crackdown on dissent to just do impulsive policy usage of power some might say yes it is

a power and your father was arrested imprisoned published by the saudi authorities in the past too in the one nine hundred ninety s. when he was a quote unquote islamist rabble rouser his critics said many would say that's why he's being imprisoned with m.b.a.'s the saudi government under any prince or king has always taken a very dim view of people who oppose the government is that so it's true to me is all this tyranny. trying to ask and demand political reform is never something that you should be punished for political reform that my father and other spoke for. is actually the solution is actually the path towards civil liberty will come up to the political reform in a moment just to confirm many say your father was arrested in september twenty seventh because he refused to publish a tweet to his fourteen million followers at the request of the saudi government that supported the saudi led blockade of qatar which full disclosure owns this channel owns al-jazeera english is that true it's

a trigger it's true because after he tweeted when he when he heard about the consultation between the qatar and saudi government he tweeted a lot between their hearts for the better of their people few hours after that tweet. he was arrested that was the trigger that's of course the direct reason that he was arrested in september two thousand seventy but there is a long yes yes history and relationship and just to be clear before we get to that long history with your father being paid by the qatari government or anyone else in qatar because that's another accusation sometimes thrown against him by supporters of the saudi government has never paid and you know what if they if he was in any at any point paid by their government or was conspiring by any conspiring with any foreign agent they would have a lot of evidence to prove they would show it in this state they have all his evidence they didn't show anything and if you if you read the just

a number and i'm against him of the charges. yeah when mohamed been so mom told bloomberg last month that one thousand five hundred saudi citizens were arrested over the last three years because he the crown prince was trying to quote get rid of extremism and terrorism without a civil war a lot of people especially in the west will hear that and say he's got a fair point they've seem hate preachers extremist clerics coming out of sober for years and living very off of the prince wants to lock some of these people up to try to shut down extremism what's your response to be honest all that says it's not accurate he is a tale in the he's attacking the very moderate voices that actually spearheaded the campaign against terrorism for the past two decades my father for example was the one who are. called called a spade a spade he pinpoint terrorism and he called it and he banned a justice against all terrorists in serbia he was actually spearheading the

campaign really along with the state at the time that the state benefited from the old his campaign and his. firsts your father spoke about against terrorism as you say including against the nine eleven attacks against osama bin laden himself but the fact is that he was once a. hero of bin laden's al qaeda leader even cited your father's farm on the outer as his ideal personality he praised your father for in lightening muslim youth you accept surely at the very minimum that whatever he says now he was once a quote unquote extremist well you know where in the eighty's bin laden light so much of their oil family and he was very close to them those who actually gave all the platform those who push the jihadi agenda at that time those who run who ran the show at that time those who should be responsible my father was a popular cleric he was admired by everybody the royal at that time he was

respected by the royal family by the people but just in time a lot of hours just to be fair and get our facts right when billard turned against the saudi government when he'd already carried out the world trade center attacks and he published his famous fatwa against americans and foreign invaders etc in the mid ninety's he was still praising your dad no he's not he's actually just use in my father's popularity to get into his audience as your father was never a fan of below no he was never a fan of that he did not even consider bin laden a scholar or a shift but he clearly has evolved in his views over the years i think it's fair of course but he was never violent while we were violent but he's evolved his views let's say in this very crude words from a more conservative position to a more liberal position i think westerners would put it as special and socially socially so for democracy or not muslims around sectarianism or his attitudes towards gay people is it fair to say that if your father was left undisturbed by the government unable to preach unable to talk to his fourteen million followers

and tell about history news he could actually have. a more reformist impact on the saudi population than muhammad bin so much yes vitriol and that's why i haven't said man attacked him because he could pull the wrong end under the quote unquote to form a stage and it could expose so the reformist agenda that the state now is saying it's pushing for so on mohammed bin salma jamal khashoggi and his gruesome death at the hands of this team of saudi assassins in istanbul do you believe m.b.'s muhammad been sold on the saudi crown prince gave the order to kill jamal khashoggi . well you know what gave the attorney general the order to seek death penalty against my father for similar views of that of g.'s whole actually there are reports even of that and the torture in so did prison while i'm speaking right now turkey and just said it was reportedly dad ended torture into

rabia. a man a do we she's also reportedly dad but we're not sure why you believe the crown prince is responsible for these deaths and for jamal khashoggi as do we were ordered that whoever so that will actually will be responsible for the death of jamal khashoggi of dylan jamal khashoggi was on the show a lot from back in march he said he didn't quote want to be the next fall model i would i'm referring to your father being in prison at the time tragically ended up meeting a fate worse than your father's dare i ask do you know worry what will happen to you how much of a for do you think there is against you as a saudi citizen now living in the us criticizing and being in the saudi authorities while while i thought some point i thought it's very difficult for the state to use the long arm to reach dissidents approach and those those who just did not

present themselves as dissidents. g. and me. but now after what's happened. i think everyone is i mean the message actually the state sent is that everyone is threatened everyone we can we should be one everywhere so it's very very dangerous and we have seen you have to do i get threats like every hour not every day on twitter i get threats from different parties yeah and i believe you have more than a dozen members of your family etc who've been banned from traveling as true so they can come and see you and you can go and see them yes really. one last question abdulla you've been here in the u.s. since the summer of twenty seventeen before your father's arrest back home in saudi arabia do you have any message for donald trump for jared crucial for john bolton for these hardcore supporters of m.b.a.'s and the saudi government here in washington d.c. well if we want to perpetuate a good relationship that lasts longer and for the best interest of both parties we

should do that with the saudi people with the saudi institutions if one individual was impulsive was really down juris there are many alternatives we have seen that even within the royal family there are so many royals who could or could understand the reformist agenda the real reformist agenda could allow for a margin of freedom for the people could could protect the basic rights of the saudi people so what's the n b n b a said gender and his team is it producing is actually the environment that establishes that could establish. an environment for terrorists or flourish and to live up to the louder we'll have to leave it there thank you so much for joining me on that front that's our show up

front will be back next week. fresh perspectives. possibilities. then they stand in. debates and discussions how can you trust a man like that how could he work again with a man like that she seems to be saying if facts all of us and we just don't know or care enough al-jazeera is award winning programs take you on a journey around the. only al-jazeera. stories generate thousands of headlines with different angles from different perspectives a caravan fact health and a highly dangerous one of the major issues before voters is the institution

president trump cannot stop talking about the news separate from the facts the misinformation from the journalism three shots of the a.b.c.'s reporting free to leave the listening post on al-jazeera. u.s. media reports say the cia believes the saudi crown prince mohammed bin sultan did order the killing of jamal khashoggi flatly contradicting saudi denials. hello and welcome i'm peter w. watching al-jazeera live from our headquarters here in.