Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud

Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud (Arabic: محمد بن سلمان آل سعود, romanized: Muḥammad bin Salmān Āl Su‘ūd; born 31 August 1985), colloquially known by his initials MBS or MbS, is Crown Prince and Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia. He also serves as the chairman of the Council of Economic and Development Affairs and chairman of the Council of Political and Security Affairs. He is considered the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, being deemed as such even before his appointment as prime minister in 2022. He served as minister of defense from 2015 to 2022. He is the seventh son of King Salman.

Mohammed was born as the first child of Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz and his third wife, Fahda bint Falah Al Hithlain. After obtaining a law degree from King Saud University, he served as an advisor to his father. After his father became king, Mohammed was appointed defense minister and deputy crown prince in 2015. He was promoted to crown prince after the dismissal of Crown Prince Muhammad bin Nayef, King Salman's nephew, in 2017. Salman ceded the position of prime minister to Mohammed in 2022.

Mohammed rules an authoritarian government. There are no democratic institutions in Saudi Arabia, and elements of repression are evident. Islamic scholars, human rights activists, women's rights activists, journalists, former insiders, Islamists, and other political dissidents are systematically repressed through tactics including torture and jailing, and some reports have stated that Mohammed uses a group known as the Tiger Squad to carry out extrajudicial killings. He was personally linked to the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi Arabian Washington Post columnist who had criticised the Saudi government, but he has denied involvement in the killing. Mohammed was the architect of Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen which has exacerbated the humanitarian crisis and famine there. His government was also involved in the escalation of the Qatar diplomatic crisis, the 2017 detention of Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri, a 2018 diplomatic spat with Canada, the arrest of Saudi princes and billionaires in 2017, the 2018–2019 Saudi crackdown on feminists, an alleged phone hack against Amazon chairman Jeff Bezos in 2019, and treason charges against his cousin and rival Muhammad bin Nayef in 2020. Saudi Arabia's relations with the Biden Administration have been strained, especially after Mohammed's refusal to increase oil production in the wake of 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Mohammed has touted reforms in an effort to rebrand his regime's image internationally and within the kingdom. These include regulations restricting the powers of the religious police and improving women's rights, such as the removal of the ban on female drivers in 2018 and weakening the male-guardianship system in 2019. Other cultural developments under his reign include the first Saudi public concerts by a female singer, the first Saudi sports stadium to admit women, an increased presence of women in the workforce, and opening the country to international tourists by introducing an e-visa system, allowing foreign visas to be applied for and issued via the Internet. The Saudi Vision 2030 program aims to diversify the country's economy through investment in non-oil sectors including technology and tourism. Under Mohammed, Saudi Arabia started co-ordinating its energy policy with Russia since 2016, and also strengthened its relations with China, signing a comprehensive strategic partnership with Xi Jinping in 2022.