Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, and Bill Ford, chairman of the Ford Motor Co., are the latest business leaders to drop out of an investment conference in Saudi Arabia in the wake of the disappearance and presumed murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Khashoggi, a Saudi reporter and columnist for The Washington Post, has not been seen since entering the Saudi consulate in Turkey earlier this month. He was a known critic of Saudi policies, and Turkish authorities claim he was killed inside the building.
Following his disappearance, business executives and media organizations began dropping out of the the Future Investment Initiative conference, which is scheduled to begin Oct. 23 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The economic summit is intended to highlight Saudi Arabia’s role in global business.
CNBC reported Dimon’s withdrawal Sunday from the conference, known as “Davos in the Desert,” saying the bank had told anchor Wilfred Frost about the change in plans. No specific reasons were given.
Earlier in the day, Reuters reported that Ford would not be attending the conference.
Others who have said they will not attend:
- Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi
- Viacom Chief Executive Bob Bakish
- Billionaire Steve Case, one of the founders of AOL
- Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong
- HP executive Joanna Popper
- Arianna Huffington, who sits on Uber’s board and runs a consulting firm called Thrive Global.(Huffington is no longer affiliated with HuffPost.)
Media companies that have said they will not be participating include:
- Bloomberg
- CNBC
- CNN
- The Economist
- Financial Times
- Nikkei
- The New York Times.
Among those still scheduled to attend (as of Sunday night):
- U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin
- Christine Lagarde, chairwoman of the International Monetary Fund
HuffPost’s Lee Moran contributed to this report.
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