Vice Media secretly organised $20m Saudi government festival

theguardian.com:

When social media influencers turned up at the Azimuth music festival in the middle of the Saudi Arabian desert they were promised a festival of musical and gastronomic excess, all subsidised by an arm of the Saudi government.

What attendees did not know was that the pricey music festival was secretly organised by youth media company Vice, as part of the media company’s ongoing push to make money in the Middle Eastern state despite the country’s poor human rights record.

Just three years after Vice publicly announced that it was pausing all work in Saudi Arabia due to the fallout from the state-ordered murder of dissident Jamal Khashoggi, insiders at Vice told the Guardian the company was once again aggressively pursuing business opportunities in Saudi Arabia.

“Vice employees have for years raised concerns over the company’s involvement with Saudi Arabia – and we’ve been fobbed off with empty statements and pathetic excuses,” said one Vice employee.

Although the Azimuth music festival received little publicity in the western media when it took place at the start of the Covid pandemic, it is believed to be have been highly lucrative for Vice. Staff at the company estimate the total budget was $20m (£15m).

The event promised to bring together the best of eastern culture (it took place among ancient carvings at the historic world heritage site of Al-’Ula on an ancient trade route) with the best of western culture (it featured a performance from the dance duo Chainsmokers).

The lineup was topped by French electronic musician Jean-Michel Jarre who