RIYADH, June 7: Saudi Arabia has overcome ‘a violent campaign by Al Qaeda militants’, King Abdullah was quoted as saying by Saudi newspapers on Wednesday.

The remarks were the first official Saudi claim to have defeated militancy. Until now the official line was that despite the weakening strength of the Al Qaeda, they were yet to be eradicated and that it could take some time before they could be wiped off.

“I can assure you that your country is well and the evil-doers are, thank God, defeated,” the king said at his royal court while talking to a delegation of visiting government officials on Tuesday.

“We say that they are finished now. As we have said before, we would drive them back whether it takes 20 years or more, but, God willing, they already have been,” he said in comments carried by Al-Riyadh daily.

Officials say about 144 foreigners and Saudis and 120 militants have died in attacks and clashes with police since May 2003.