President Trump says he wants to find out what happened

President Donald Trump said on Thursday that U.S. investigators were working with both Ankara and Riyadh to probe the suspicious disappearance in Turkey of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

“We can’t let it happen. And we’re being very tough and we have investigators over there and we’re working with Turkey and frankly we’re working with Saudi Arabia,” Mr. Trump said in an interview with “Fox and Friends.”

“I have to find out what happened,” he said, when asked if U.S.-Saudi relations would be jeopardised by the disappearance of Mr. Khashoggi. .

“We’re probably getting closer than you might think,” he added.

Turkey denies claim

However, Turkey on Thursday denied the President Trump’s claim. “The information that the United States has tasked investigators over the Khashoggi case is not correct,” said a Turkish diplomatic source, quoted by the state-run Anadolu news agency.

Mr. Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributor, who lived in the United States vanished on October 2 after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul to obtain a document needed to marry his Turkish fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, who waited for him outside.

Turkish police say he was murdered inside the consulate by a 15-member Saudi team that flew into the country just ahead of Mr. Khashoggi’s scheduled appointment, and left the same day, according to Turkish government sources.

The Post, citing U.S. intelligence intercepts, had earlier reported that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered an operation to trap Mr. Khashoggi.