Saudi Arabia's state-run news agency says King Salman now has a proposal on the "urgent need'' to restructure the kingdom's intelligence services after the slaying of Saudi writer Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.
The state-run Saudi Press Agency made the announcement early Saturday.
It came immediately after the official announcement by the kingdom that Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was killed at the consulate and that 18 Saudis were detained as suspects in the killing.
Private A Haber TV said as many as 15 employees were being questioned on Friday.
The station said they included the consul's driver, technicians, accountants and telephone operators.
Khashoggi was last seen entering the consulate on Oct. 2.
Turkish reports say Khashoggi was murdered and dismembered inside the consulate by members of an assassination squad with ties to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The Saudis have dismissed those reports as baseless.
Earlier, an Associated Press journalist witnessed a group of people leaving the building, getting into a van belonging to the Saudi mission and being driven away.
A former head of Britain's MI6 overseas intelligence agency says Khashoggi was probably killed on the orders of people close to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
John Sawers, who headed MI6 between 2009 and 2014, said "all the evidence points to it being ordered and carried out'' by people close to Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler.
Sawers told the BBC that "I don't think he would have done this if he hadn't thought he had license from the U.S. administration to frankly behave as he wished to do so.''
Sawyers said the fate of Khashoggi was a wake-up call to the Trump administration about "just how dangerous it is to have people acting with a sense that they have impunity in their relationship with United States.''
-With files from The Associated Press