The Saudis were bedfellows with western media for awhile. Western media was going to scare the west into a complete cessation of production of fossil fuels and this would have immensely benefited the Saudis. But the fake news got too crazy for even them to handle. I mean imagine telling everyone that the world was definitively going to end in a decade or two from fossil fuel, totally covering up the Yemen War and then still pissing off the Saudis. It’s hard to do.
I personally think that suits against the companies themselves are unlikely to get anywhere but suits against asset managers that went balls deep on ESG have a high probability of surviving a motion to dismiss and creating change.
If they want the IP they would take it subject to some guardrails. These assholes know the paradigm shifted the day rates went north of 4% and now they have to produce and they know the blue haired xirs ain’t gonna produce.
It’s that, the reporter who died in Saudi Arabia and the general level of insanity and utter disrespect western journalists displayed to the Arab world during the last World Cup.