''BASELESS'' : SAUDI REJECTS MURDER CLAIMS

SAUDI ARABIA dismissed on Saturday accusations that Jamal Khashoggi was ordered murdered by a hit squad inside its Istanbul consulate as ''lies and baseless allegations,'' as Riyadh and Ankara spar over the missing journalist's fate.

A Saudi delegation was in Turkey for talks on the case, which threatens not only to harm fragile relations between the two countries but also to do serious damage to the  reformist credentials of  Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the Kingdom's ties to the West.

As the controversy intensified, the Washington Post reported Turkish officials had recordings made from inside the building that allegedly proved their claims that Khashoggi was tortured and  killed at the consulate.

[Officers were looking into sound recordings sent from from a smartwatch Khashoggi was wearing when he entered the consulateto a mobile phone he gave to his Turkish fiance outside, Hatice Cengiz.

Turkish daily Milliyet reported ''arguments and shouting'' could be heard on the recordings].

Big names from media and business have already cancelled appearances at a major conference in Riyadh this month and both the IMF chief and the US treasury secretary made their attendance conditional on the findings in the case.

In the first Saudi ministerial reaction to Turkish accusations that Khashoggi was killed, Interior Minister Price Abdel Aziz  bin Saud bin Nayef condemned  ''what has been reported in certain media concerning false accusations against the Saudi Arabia................in the case of the disappearance of citizen Khashoggi''.

''What has been reported on the matter of orders to kill him is a lie and baseless allegation,'' the minister said in comments carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.

He added the Kingdom was ''in compliance with international laws and conventions.'' [Agencies]