A Journalist's Disappearance: Where Jamal Khashoggi Was Last Seen

Jamal Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi journalist and dissident, remains missing a week after he seemed to disappear inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.

Mr. Khashoggi’s fiancée and friends fear he has been either kidnapped or killed. Turkish investigators have concluded that he is dead. The Saudi government maintains that he left the consulate on Oct. 2 and is not in their custody.

Here is what we know about the details of Mr. Khashoggi’s disappearance.

Akasyali St.

Mr. Khashoggi was

last seen on Oct. 2 walking toward this entrance.

Entrance

Saudi Arabia Consulate, Istanbul

The consulate is in the financial district.

It is a six-story building with

entrances at the front and back.

Akagac St.

Entrance

Akasyali St.

Mr. Khashoggi was

last seen on Oct. 2 walking toward this entrance.

Entrance

Saudi Arabia Consulate, Istanbul

The consulate is in the financial district.

It is a six-story building with

entrances at the front and back.

Akagac St.

Entrance

Akasyali St.

Mr. Khashoggi was

last seen on Oct. 2 walking toward this entrance.

Entrance

Akagac St.

Entrance

Saudi Arabia Consulate, Istanbul

The consulate is in the financial district. It is a six-story building with entrances at the front and back.

Mr. Khashoggi was

last seen on Oct. 2 walking toward this entrance.

Akasyali St.

Entrance

Akagac St.

Saudi Arabia

Consulate, Istanbul

The consulate is in the financial district. It is a six-story building with entrances at the front and back.

Entrance

The New York Times | Aerial image by The Associated Press

Friday, Sept. 28

Khashoggi makes an initial visit to the consulate

Mr. Khashoggi, a Saudi citizen, had been living in self-imposed exile in the United States since last year. He visited the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to collect a document that would allow him to marry his Turkish fiancée, but was told he would have to return.

He left Istanbul that afternoon and flew to London for a conference.

At some point after that visit, most likely over the weekend, Mr. Khashoggi called the consulate saying he could return to pick up the document the next Tuesday. Someone from the consulate later called him back and asked him to come in at 1:30 p.m. the day of the appointment, his fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, said.

Saturday, Sept. 29

Khashoggi travels to London

Jamal Khashoggi spoke at a conference in London organized by the Middle East Monitor on Sept. 29, three days before he went missing. Reuters

Mr. Khashoggi spoke at the conference, which was hosted by the Middle East Monitor, a nonprofit group.

He stayed through the weekend at the Ambassadors Hotel in central London, according to The Washington Post.

Monday, Oct. 1

Khashoggi travels to Istanbul

Mr. Khashoggi met two friends for lunch in London to discuss a column he had drafted about free speech in the Arab world. The friends later said he appeared unconcerned about his planned return to the consulate in Turkey.

He returned to Istanbul later on Monday, Ms. Cengiz said.

Tuesday, Oct. 2

Khashoggi disappears

At 3:13 a.m., a private charter plane carrying nine Saudi officials and intelligence officers, some with diplomatic passports, arrived at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, according to the Turkish news outlet Sabah and government officials who spoke with The New York Times.

The plane was a Gulfstream jet owned by Sky Prime Aviation Services, a charter company based in Riyadh that has long worked with the Saudi government.

A January 2018 image of the Gulfstream jet thought to have flown Saudi officials and intelligence officers from Riyadh to Istanbul hours before Mr. Khashoggi disappeared. AirTeamImages

The Saudi officials checked into two hotels near the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul’s financial district, booking rooms for three nights. They later retrieved their belongings and departed the same day.

At 1:14 p.m., Mr. Khashoggi entered the consulate. He gave his two cellphones to Ms. Cengiz and told her to get help if he did not reappear.

A still from security camera footage of Mr. Khashoggi walking toward the northern entrance of the consulate on Tuesday, Oct. 2. Hurriyet, via Associated Press

Around 4 p.m., six vehicles left the consulate carrying Saudi officials and intelligence officers, Sabah reported.

Two other vehicles drove to the Saudi consul’s residence on Meseli Street, 200 yards from the consulate. Investigators suspect Mr. Khashoggi was in one of these vehicles, Sabah reported. The vehicles stayed there for four hours. Turkish staff members of the residence were unexpectedly told not to report for work that day.

Meselik St.

Saudi consul’s residence

On Meseli Street, 200 yards

from the consulate.

Akagac St.

Saudi Arabia

Consulate

Saudi consul’s residence

On Meseli Street, 200 yards

from the consulate.

Meselik St.

Akagac St.

Saudi Arabia Consulate

Meselik St.

Saudi consul’s residence

On Meseli Street, 200 yards

from the consulate.

Akagac St.

Saudi Arabia Consulate

Meselik St.

Saudi consul’s residence

On Meseli Street, 200 yards

from the consulate.

Akagac St.

Saudi Arabia

Consulate

The New York Times | Source: Aerial image by Google

Around 5:15 p.m., a second Sky Prime Aviation Services jet carrying six Saudi officials landed at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul. It departed just over an hour later at 6:20 p.m. and stopped in Cairo before returning to Riyadh.

At 10:46 p.m., the jet that arrived earlier on Tuesday departed Istanbul for Dubai.

Ms. Cengiz waited for Mr. Khashoggi at the consulate until 1 a.m. but he did not emerge.

Wednesday, Oct. 3

Conflicting accounts of disappearance

Ms. Cengiz returned to the consulate on Wednesday morning, but there was still no sign of Mr. Khashoggi. It was supposed to be their wedding day.

Reuters reported that Mr. Khashoggi was missing, citing interviews with Ms. Cengiz and a friend. Over the course of the day, there were conflicting accounts of Mr. Khashoggi’s whereabouts.

Turan Kislakci, the head of the Turkish-Arab Media Association and a friend of Mr. Khashoggi’s, said he spoke with Turkish officials who told him Mr. Khashoggi “was killed and his body was dismembered.”

A Saudi official said that Mr. Khashoggi got his documents and left the premises on Tuesday. As questions mounted, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in an interview with Bloomberg Wednesday evening that he would allow Turkish investigators to search the consulate. “We have nothing to hide,” he said.

A State Department official said the United States was closely following the case.

Investigation Continues

In the days since, the Turkish government has opened a criminal investigation into Mr. Khashoggi’s disappearance. Officials have sought to search the consulate and twice summoned the Saudi ambassador for his cooperation.

The Saudi government has denied the initial claims made by Turkish investigators that Mr. Khashoggi was killed at the consulate.

Protesters in front of the Saudi Arabian Consulate in Istanbul on Monday. Ozan Kose/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Investigators are looking into the movements of the Saudi officials who arrived in Istanbul and left again on the day Mr. Khashoggi disappeared. Another focus of the investigation is security camera footage from outside the consulate. Mr. Kislakci, the friend of Mr. Khashoggi’s, said last week that Turkish police officers who reviewed the footage saw no sign of Mr. Khashoggi leaving the consulate on foot.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey said at a news conference on Monday, “If he left, you have to prove it with footage.” He added, “All the footage of entrance or exit of the embassy is under investigation.”

On Tuesday, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Saudi officials had agreed to allow Turkish investigators to conduct a search at the consulate, though the timing and extent of that search remained unclear.

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