JEDDAH: German Chancellor Angela Merkel met Saudi King Salman on Sunday, state media said, as she began a visit focused on bilateral relations and preparations for the next G20 meeting.

King Salman received Merkel in his palace in the western city of Jeddah, SPA state news agency said, adding that the two presided over a signing ceremony for several cooperation agreements.

Merkel was expected to discuss with the Saudis the agenda for the G20 meeting in July, including the Paris climate accord and G20 decisions on energy, according to a German official.

“There will be for sure a discussion over how Germany could support Saudi efforts to diversify its economy and reduce its dependency on fossil energy,” the official said ahead of the visit.

“Economic relations are solid but not shining. The volume of commercial exchange stood at eight billion euros ($8.72 billion) in 2016. German investments in Saudi were around 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion),” the official said.

The world’s largest oil exporter has embarked on an ambitious plan to diversify its oil-dependent economy after a sharp drop in crude prices hit revenues.

Merkel is also expected to urge Saudi Arabia and its fellow Sunni-ruled Gulf monarchies to reduce tension with their Shia-dominated neighbour Iran, the official added.Merkel travels on Monday to the United Arab Emirates, where German investments stand at around 2.4 billion euros ($2.6 billion), the German official said.

During her talks with Gulf leaders, Merkel is expected to press them to do more to take in refugees and provide humanitarian relief for those fleeing conflict in Muslim-majority countries. Her country has provided refuge to hundreds of thousands of people from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan in recent years.

Merkel is also expected to raise the issue of Saudi Arabia’s funding for religious institutions that may be spreading a fundamentalist version of Islam around the world, including in countries such as Mali and Niger, said senior German officials.

Saudi Arabia recently closed several institutional establishments in Germany following pressure from Berlin, including the private King Fahd Academy in the southern suburbs of Bonn. German authorities had previously expressed concern the school might be used to spread fundamentalist ideology.

Like other high-profile female visitors, Merkel did not cover her hair or wear a traditional flowing black robe upon arrival in the kingdom. She is expected to meet Saudi businesswomen during her two-day visit in a sign of support for women’s rights.

Merkel herself backs a ban in Germany on civil servants wearing face veils and on the face cover being worn in public schools, courts and while driving. Most Saudi women wear the full face veil, known as the niqab, in line with the kingdom’s conservative Wahhabi interpretation of Islam.

Merkel is travelling with a business delegation that includes CEOs of major German companies. The kingdom is seeking to attract investment and diversify its economy away from oil, the backbone of its economy.

The official Saudi Press Agency reported the two sides signed a number of memorandums to enhance cooperation in the fields of technology, energy, business and security.

Despite a drop in oil prices that has forced the kingdom to curb spending, Saudi Arabia remains among the world’s top spenders on defence equipment. While there is no German moratorium on weapons exports to Saudi Arabia, the German government does review deals on a case-by-case basis to ensure any defence equipment sold cannot be used for internal repression.

Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen is also expected to feature in Merkel’s talks with the kingdom’s royals. For more than two years, the kingdom has been bombing Yemeni rebels aligned with Saudi Arabia’s regional Shiite rival, Iran.

Saudi Arabia and Iran also back opposite sides of the conflict in Syria. Germany was one of six international powers that negotiated a nuclear deal with Iran that Saudi Arabia objected to.

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2017