King Abdullah, Saudi Monarch Who Modernized Economy, Dies
Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, Abdullah’s half-brother, will succeed him.
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King Abdullah, the monarch who oversaw a fivefold increase in the size of the Arab world’s biggest economy and met the Arab Spring with a mixture of force and largesse, has died after almost a decade on the throne. He was born in 1924.
Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz, Abdullah’s half-brother, will succeed him, state television announced early on Friday in Riyadh. Abdullah had been in hospital in the Saudi capital since last month, receiving treatment for pneumonia. He became Saudi Arabia’s sixth king in August 2005, after years as de facto ruler since 1996 when King Fahd was incapacitated by a stroke.