Dr. Sami Al-Homod, assistant minister for planning and development at the Saudi Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources

Dr. Sami Al-Homod
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Updated 03 March 2020
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Dr. Sami Al-Homod, assistant minister for planning and development at the Saudi Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources

  • Al-Homod was appointed vice dean of libraries for administration and financial affairs and remained in the position until 2008 when he was promoted to dean of the e-learning and distance learning department at KSU

Dr. Sami Al-Homod was recently appointed the assistant minister for planning and development at the Saudi Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources.
He gained a bachelor’s degree in information systems from Riyadh’s King Saud University (KSU) in 1994. Three years later, he obtained a master’s degree in the same subject from George Mason University in the US and achieved a Ph.D. in information technology from the same institution in 2002. Al-Homod also completed a leadership development program at Boston Consulting Group in 2013.
He began his professional career soon after his graduation from KSU, becoming a system analyst and programmer at the IT center of the Saline Water Conversion Corp. One year later, he joined his alma mater as a teaching assistant in the college of administrative sciences.
In 2004, Al-Homod was appointed vice dean of libraries for administration and financial affairs and remained in the position until 2008 when he was promoted to dean of the e-learning and distance learning department at KSU.
He became a faculty member of the management information systems department at the college of business administration in 2012 and one year later joined the Saudi Ministry of Labor and Social Development as its deputy minister for planning and development.
In 2015, he moved to the Kingdom’s Ministry of Justice as deputy minister for planning, development and informatics and supervisor of the ministry’s Vision Realization Office.
Al-Homod provided consultancy services to Riyadh municipality from 2012 to 2013 and also supervised its IT and e-services center.
In addition, he provided consultancy services to the then Ministry of Higher Education (before its merger with the Ministry of Education), Ernst & Young, and the KSU colleges of computer and information sciences, and applied sciences.
Al-Homod has received a number of international awards and honors including a UN award for public services on Smart Campus Projects in 2011, the Prince Bandar bin Sultan Award for scientific and academic achievement in 1998, and an excellence certificate in information systems from George Mason University in 1997.


Saudi, Pakistan defense chiefs discuss ‘measures needed to halt’ Iranian attacks on Kingdom

Updated 07 March 2026
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Saudi, Pakistan defense chiefs discuss ‘measures needed to halt’ Iranian attacks on Kingdom

RIYADH: Saudi Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman and Pakistan’s  Chief of Defense Forces Asim Munir discussed Iran’s attacks on the Kingdom, amid the escalating military conflict in the Middle East. 

“We discussed Iranian attacks on the Kingdom and the measures needed to halt them within the framework of our Joint Strategic Defense Agreement,” Prince Khalid wrote on social media early on Saturday.

“We stressed that such actions undermine regional security and stability and expressed hope that the Iranian side will exercise wisdom and avoid miscalculation.”

The US and Israel began a large-scale military campaign against Iran on Feb. 28. Iran has since attacked a number of sites across the Gulf.

Tehran has also attacked US and Israeli military assets as the war as escalated, impacting lives in the peaceful Arabian Gulf peninsula and risked shaking the global economy as Iran continued restricting energy shipping along the Strait of Hormuz.

The Saudi Defense Ministry said a number of drones had been shot down that were targeting the Shayba oil field in the Empty Quarter on Saturday.

A drone attacked the US embassy in Riyadh on Tuesday causing a minor fire, but no one was hurt in the incident.

Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed a “Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement”  in September, pledging that aggression against one country would be treated as an attack on both.

Separately, Prince Abdulaziz bin Saud bin Naif, the Saudi interior minister, received a call from his Pakistani counterpart Raza Naqvi, who condemned the blatant attacks targeting the Kingdom and affirmed his country’s solidarity in confronting any threats to the Kingdom’s security and stability, the Saudi Press Agency reported on Saturday.