on september 18, 1932 , the kingdoms of nejd and hejaz united to form saudi arabia. islam and the caliphate arose here in the 7th century and the foundations of arab statehood were laid, but then came conquerors, the ottoman turks, and more than a thousand years passed before the independence movement began. they rose up more than once, suffered defeats, were hampered by civil strife, the warring parties relied sometimes on the turks, sometimes on the british. as a result of the first world war, when the ottoman empire collapsed, two arab kingdoms emerged: hejaz in the west of the peninsula, with the holy places of mecca and medina, and nejd with its center in riyadh. during the confrontation, fortune was on the side of the emir of nejd, abdel-aziz ibn saud, who conquered the hejaz and became the first king of saudi arabia arabia. on this day, september 18 , 1932, he signed a decree on the creation of a unified state, which was announced on september 23. er-riyadh maintained ties with the ussr and abdalaziz highly valued the soviet envoy karim khakimov , nicknamed re