US approves $1b in Saudi Arabia defence contracts

Washington: The United States formally approved defence contracts totalling more than $1 billion (Dh3.67 billion) with Saudi Arabia on Thursday, as the kingdom’s Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman continued his American tour.

The State Department confirmed it had green-lighted a $670 million deal for anti-tank missiles, a $106 million contract for helicopter maintenance and $300 million for ground vehicle parts.

An official said the deals had been in the pipeline since President Donald Trump has announced more than $100 billion in possible new contracts on a visit to Riyadh last year.

“This proposed sale will support US foreign policy and national security objectives by improving the security of a friendly country,” the Defence Security Cooperation Agency said.

The contracts are expected to be nodded through US Congress after the State Department and Pentagon gave the go-ahead and Trump publicly celebrated the prospect of the sales.

Saudi Arabia’s young crown prince and de facto ruler Mohammad Bin Salman is part-way through a three-week tour of America that has already taken him to friendly talks in Trump’s White House.

The largest of the three contracts is for 6,600 TOW 2B anti-tank missiles, made by US giant Raytheon.

The next biggest covers spare parts and maintenance for the Saudi ground forces’ pool of US-built Abram tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, LAV armoured vehicles, howitzers and Humvees.

The last continues a support contract for the Saudi fleet of AH-64D and E Apache attack helicopters, UK-60L Black Hawk utility choppers and Schweizer and Bell scouts.