JUDY WOODRUFF: In early October, 2018, Washington Post columnist and Saudi national Jamal Khashoggi
walked into Saudi Arabia's consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, in pursuit of documents for his impending
marriage.
He did not know he was the one being pursued. His brutal murder there became a global story.
He was perhaps the most high-profile critic of his homeland's monarchy.
Now a new film charts his life, his grisly death, his legacy, and where Saudi Arabia
is right now.
Here's Nick Schifrin.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Jamal Khashoggi's murder snuffed out a critic of today's Saudi government.
Two years later, his allies are trying to ensure his silenced voice can still be heard.
A new film shows a complex man who never completed his final act.
Lawrence Wright is a writer and the executive producer of "Kingdom of Silence."
LAWRENCE WRIGHT, Executive Producer, "Kingdom of Silence": I see Jamal's life in three acts,
just like a classical drama.
NICK SCHIFRIN: That first act was in Afghanistan, covering the U.S.-backed Mujahideen fighting
the Soviet Union. Khashoggi helped make the leading Arab anti-Russian fighter famous.
JAMAL KHASHOGGI, The Washington Post: I do not deny that I had sympathy toward Afghan
cause, because I myself come out from Islamic circles. And it was a big story, which kind
of made my name in the field of journalism.
NICK SCHIFRIN: But after 9/11, Khashoggi turned against bin Laden's manipulated version of
Islam. Khashoggi wrote this, as read by an actor:
ACTOR: "We must ensure that our children can never be influenced by extremist ideas, like
those 15 Saudis who were misled into piloting them and all of us into the jaws of hell."
NICK SCHIFRIN: Khashoggi joined the Saudi government and championed U.S.-Saudi relations,
including the war in Iraq, but then his third act. The Arab Spring birthed his belief in
freedom of speech as the key to regional reform.
He started a news channel called Al Arab designed to give Saudis access to uncensored information.
But the new Saudi King Salman, and his son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, or MBS,
rejected Al Arab and free media as a threat.
Khashoggi had to flee Saudi Arabia. He watched as MBS persecuted his critics and tolerated
no dissent.
Saudi activist Yahya Assiri spoke at a recent Project on Middle East Democracy event.
YAHYA ASSIRI, Saudi Activist; If you go, for example, to challenge the regime, to criticize
the regime, they will take you to prison.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Khashoggi became an MBS critic in the pages of The Washington Post and wrote
this:
ACTOR: "Saudi Arabia wasn't always this repressive. I have left my home, my family, and my job.
And I am raising my voice."
NICK SCHIFRIN: That cost him his life. He walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul
and was murdered by Saudi agents close to MBS. One even put on Khashoggi's clothes and
walked out of the consulate to try and deceive the CCTV cameras.
SARAH LEAH WHITSON, Democracy for the Arab World Now: This kind of grotesque barbarism,
having some guy trot out his clothes, it was just too much.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Sarah Leah Whitson is a human rights advocate, and was a longtime friend
of Khashoggi's. Last week, she relaunched an organization that Khashoggi created.
NARRATOR: DAWN, Democracy for the Arab World Now.
SARAH LEAH WHITSON: The only solution that will bring lasting peace and ability, security,
prosperity, but also dignity, to the people of the region was democracy and human rights.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Initially, MBS was considered a reformer. On a 2018 U.S. tour, he met Silicon
Valley executives, the U.N. secretary-general, and President Trump.
DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: We have become very good friends.
NICK SCHIFRIN: For the Trump administration, MBS has helped lead an anti-Iran alliance
and bought American weapons, including for the Saudi-backed war in Yemen that has killed
tens of thousands of civilians.
Back home, MBS has ushered in dramatic reforms, trying to curb the conservative clergy's power
and allowing women to attend movies and sporting events.
LAWRENCE WRIGHT: Jamal believed that MBS offering some freedom, some reforms, and taking away
others. The one that he was taking away was perhaps the most valuable, which was the ability
to speak, to have an opinion.
NICK SCHIFRIN: DAWN is designed to document those restrictions and call out governments
who support Arab autocrats.
SARAH LEAH WHITSON: We need to focus very specifically on the way in which the American
people, the American citizenry are enabling and promoting a dictatorship and tyranny in
the Middle East.
NICK SCHIFRIN: The Saudi government said it punished Khashoggi's murderers.
But human rights organizations say Saudi senior officials and the man the CIA assessed likely
ordered the murder walked free.
LAWRENCE WRIGHT: I hoped that there would be some kind of accountability, but there's
not. At the governmental level, there's just not.
SARAH LEAH WHITSON: While judicial justice evaded us, MBS has paid a huge price, and
in the court of public opinion, he has been found guilty.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Last month, a group of Saudis in exile formed the country's first opposition
party. The group hopes to institute democracy as a form of government in the kingdom. That's
not expected anytime soon, but Wright believes Saudi's ruling family faces reckoning.
LAWRENCE WRIGHT: People are beginning to wonder, do we really need these people?
I think, at that point, Saudi Arabia's going to face a terrible crisis, and it would have
done better if Jamal had been here to help show them the way.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Khashoggi didn't live to see that final act, but his death helped guarantee
that the conversation he started in life will continue.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Nick Schifrin.