The chief executive of Japan’s biggest bank has pulled out of Saudi Arabia’s financial conference dubbed “Davos in the Desert,” joining a growing list of withdrawals following the killing of a government critic at the kingdom’s consulate in Turkey.
MUFG Bank Ltd CEO Kanetsugu Mike (pictured) won’t attend the Future Investment Initiative conference that begins tomorrow, spokesman Kazunobu Takahara said yesterday by phone, without giving a reason for his withdrawal. Eiichi Yoshikawa, deputy president of the unit of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc, will go instead, Takahara said.
Mike, who was scheduled to speak at the event, becomes the latest top official to cancel after Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a critic of the country’s leadership, was killed inside its Istanbul consulate. Others including US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had withdrawn even before the kingdom over the weekend acknowledged the Washington Post contributor’s killing, while characterising it as accidental.
MUFG has been growing its presence in the oil-rich nation, having last year obtained approval to open a branch there. The bank plans to hire as many as 60 people in the country over three to five years, Elyas Algaseer, the bank’s co-head in the Middle East and North Africa, said in an interview in August 2017. Pages 2, 16
