Okaz/Saudi Gazette

JEDDAH — Saudi Minister of Defense Prince Khalid bin Salman graced the inaugural ceremony of ‘His Majesty’s Ship Jazan,’ the fourth ship of the Sarawat project at King Faisal Naval Base under the Western Fleet in Jeddah on Monday. This is the first ship under the Sarawat project to complete the construction of its systems and carry out acceptance trials on the Saudi lands and waters.

Upon his arrival at King Faisal Naval Base, Prince Khalid was received by the Chief of the General Staff Lt. Gen. Fayyad Al-Ruwaili, and the Chief of Staff of the Royal Saudi Naval Forces (RSNF) Lt. Gen. Fahd Al-Ghufaili.

In his address at the ceremony, Lt. Gen. Al-Ghufaili welcomed the minister. He said that the new ship will contribute to raising the level of readiness of the Saudi naval forces, enhance maritime security in the region, and protect the vital strategic interests of the Kingdom. He also highlighted the unlimited support enjoyed by the armed forces in general and the naval forces in particular by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman, the Supreme Commander of all military forces, and Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman.

Lt. Gen. Al-Ghufaili stated that the defensive capabilities of the ship “His Majesty’s Ship Jazan” were localized, and acceptance tests for its systems were conducted completely on Saudi lands and waters, including live firing tests for various air and surface targets, in an actual and realistic embodiment of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030. “The ships, under the Sarawat project, are the most modern of their types in the world, and are equipped with the first Saudi battle management system under the name “Hazm”, developed by the Saudi professionals.

After his speech, Prince Khalid bin Salman boarded the ship’s flight deck and raised the Kingdom’s flag, marking its formal entry into service in the naval fleet, and then the ship’s radars and whistles and the whistles of neighboring ships, began to operate, welcoming its entry into service as the fourth ship of the ‘Sarawat project.’

After that, the minister toured the command tower, then wrote a word in the ship’s historical record, and a group photo was taken with the ship’s crew. At the conclusion of the ceremony, Lt. Gen. Al-Ghufaili presented Prince Khalid with a souvenir on this occasion.

The inauguration ceremony was attended by Assistant Minister of Defense for Executive Affairs Dr. Khalid bin Hussein Al-Biyari, Director General of the Office of the Minister of Defense Hisham bin Abdulaziz bin Saif, CEO of Sami Company Eng. Walid bin Abdulmajeed Abu Khaled, and a number of senior Saudi civilian and military officials.

It was also attended from the Spanish side by Xiana Mendez, secretary of state for trade at the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Admiral D. Gonzalo Sanz Alisedo, chief of Naval Personnel, Jorge Hevia Sierra, ambassador of Spain to Saudi Arabia, Alvaro Lobo, commercial and business director of Saudi Navantia Company for the MENA and Asia region and a number of civilian and military officials.

All ships in the Sarawat project will be equipped with a 100 percent Saudi battle management system, known as “HAZEM packets,” which was designed by Saudis and an integrated work team as part of the “Sami Navantia” company’s purpose inside the “Avante 2200” project. HMS Jazan is the fourth of the five avante 2200 corvettes, built for the RSNF by Spanish state-owned company Navantia as part of the Sarawat project. The first three ships that were commissioned earlier were HMS Al-Jubail, Diriya and Hail.