Saudi Arabia
Power plays inside the Saudi royal family always set tongues wagging, and rumours abounded that King Salman was close to death, or that MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman) sensed a palace coup was in the offing and moved quickly to snuff it out. There was no truth to either of these claims, which ignored the far more obvious answer: it was a message from both Salman and MBS to the rest of the family to get into line, an act of discipline that will secure loyalty and remind everyone who the boss is. And make no mistake, MBS is unequivocally the boss of Saudi Arabia.
