Special to WorldTribune.com

ABU DHABI — Saudi Arabia has acknowledged that its crown prince is
ill.

The Saudi government reported that Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz was flown to the United States for medical tests. State media, including the official Saudi Press Agency, said Nayef, 78, was checked into a hospital in
Cleveland.

“Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, deputy premier and interior minister, arrived in the city of Cleveland in the United States of America on March 9, coming from the kingdom of Morocco to conduct scheduled medical tests,” SPA said.

The announcement on March 9 appeared to verify an opposition report earlier in the week that Nayef fell ill and would be flown to the United States for treatment. The Saudi opposition said Nayef, first taken to Morocco for initial treatment, was believed to have sustained a stroke.

In October 2011, Nayef was named crown prince in wake of the death of Prince Sultan. Over the last two years, Nayef was regarded as the most
powerful member of the royal family and responsible for security and foreign
policy.

Nayef’s hospitalization came amid reports of rare Sunni unrest in
Saudi Arabia. Units of the religious police employed water cannons to
disperse a sit-in protest by women students at Abha University in the
southern part of the kingdom. The women, one of them reported killed, had
been protesting lack of hygiene on campus.

“Female students gathered on the campus and began shouting in a way that
contradicts [regulations],” the university said in a statement.

  Abha University protest, Ailing Saudi heir in U.S. for medical treatment, Cleveland, Crown Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, death of Prince Sultan, possible stroke