Saudi Arabia, which often confounds outsiders with its slow and opaque governance, has moved surprisingly quickly under King Salman, its new monarch, to streamline government and purge officials who were seen as underperformers.
The architect of the government shakeup has been Mohammed bin Salman, the king’s aggressive, Western-oriented, 34-year-old son, who has taken the positions of defense minister and chief of the royal court. He is said to have planned the succession moves carefully in the weeks before the death of King Abdullah on Jan. 23, and executed them quickly to check protests within the royal family.
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