A Saudi man accused of having a role in the murder of Jamal Khashoggi has been arrested in France, police said.
Khalid Alotaibi was detained by border police on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by Turkey as he was about to board a flight to Riyadh from Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport.
The 33-year-old is one of 26 Saudis charged in absentia by Turkey over the killing in a trial that got underway in October 2020.
Mr Khashoggi - a prominent Saudi who lived in self-exile in the United States and wrote for The Washington Post - entered the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018 to file paperwork to marry his Turkish fiancee.
According to US and Turkish officials, a Saudi hit squad strangled him and dismembered his body, which has never been retrieved.
The gruesome murder sparked international outrage that continues to reverberate, with Western intelligence agencies accusing Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of authorising the killing, which he has denied.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the order to murder Mr Khashoggi came from "the highest levels" of the Saudi government, and the case led to tensions between Ankara and Riyadh.
But Mr Erdogan has never directly blamed Prince Mohammed and there have in recent months been signs of the thaw between Turkey and Saudi Arabia, with the Turkish foreign minister visiting Riyadh earlier this year in a bid to mend ties.
Two of the 26 being tried in absentia in Turkey are former aides to Prince Mohammed, and Mr Alotaibi is also one of 17 people that the US Treasury designated for sanctions in 2018 over their alleged role in the murder.
Emmanuel Macron defended the inclusion of Saudi Arabia on a tour of Gulf States. Source: Saudi Royal Court
Tuesday's arrest of Mr Alotaibi comes only days after French President Emmanuel Macron defended his decision to include Saudi Arabia in a tour of Gulf states, saying the visit did not mean that he had "forgotten" about the Khashoggi case.
After meeting with the Saudi crown prince, Mr Macron said he had raised the question of human rights "without any taboo", and said he hoped to see progress over the coming weeks and months.
On the third anniversary of the killing, Mr Khashoggi's widow Hatice Cengiz, who was waiting outside the consulate while the murder took place, accused the US of failing to hold Saudi Arabia accountable.
The Saudi embassy in Paris said on Tuesday the man arrested as a suspect in the killing of Mr Khashoggi has no connection with the case.
