King Fahd
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Fahd (Ibn Abd al-Aziz al-Saud), was born in Riyadh in 1923, and took control of Saudi Arabia upon the death of his half-brother Faisal in 1975. Officially Fahd became king when his other half-brother, Khalid, died in 1982.
The succession of the various brothers is an extraordinary one. As the BBC remarks: " [King Fahd] was one of seven sons of the founder of Saudi Arabia, King Abdel-Aziz, and his favourite wife, Hassa.
"He was the fourth of his siblings to be king. Two of his brothers lost power violently - one was deposed in a coup; the other was assassinated."
- During the Gulf War of 1990-1991 King Fahd allowed American and British armed forces on Saudi Territory in the war effort against Iraq.
- Before becoming King, Fahd's duties included attending the opening session of the UN general assembly in New York in 1945 and from 1953 acting as Saudi minister for education.
- Fahd played a vital role in the expansion of the Mecca mosque, which now holds a million worshippers.
- When King Fahd, who was widely regarded as a moderniser, died in August 2005, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said: "King Fahd was a man of great vision and leadership who inspired his countrymen for a quarter of a century as king, and for many more before that ..."
- After he died, one of King Fahd's wives claimed that her eldest daughter was fathered by him in Riyadh in January 1974. According to The Times: "Then, he was a playboy Prince with a number of wives. She was a beautiful diplomat from a Palestinian Christian family. They had married five years earlier against the wishes of his family because she was not born a Muslim, her friends said."