Breaking news: Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah dies aged 91 after battle with pneumonia
- King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz had been in hospital since December suffering from pneumonia
- He took power in 2005 after the death of his half-brother King Fahd and was thought to be 91, although official accounts are unclear
- King Abdullah was admitted to the King Abdulaziz Medical City of the National Guard in Riyadh in December to undergo medical tests
- The royal court earlier this month said that the king was suffering from pneumonia and had temporarily needed help to breathe through a tube
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz - the powerful U.S. ally who sought to modernise the ultraconservative Muslim kingdom with incremental but significant reforms - has died aged 91, it has been confirmed.
The royal had been in hospital since December, battling pneumonia.
King Abdullah’s half-brother Salman has become king, a statement attributed to Salman said.
His death was confirmed on state television early on Friday morning, Saudi time, with channels cutting to Koranic verses - an action which often signifies the death of a top royal.
King of Saudi Arabia Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud has died aged 91
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, left, speaks with Prince Salman, the Saudi King's brother and Riyadh governor, right, before the king's departure to United States, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
A statement released by the new king read: ‘His Highness Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and all members of the family and the nation mourn the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz, who passed away at exactly 1am this morning.'
Abdullah had ruled Saudi Arabia as king since 2005, but had run the country as de facto regent for a decade before that after his predecessor King Fahd suffered a debilitating stroke.
King Salman, thought to be 79, has been crown prince and defence minister since 2012. He was governor of Riyadh province for five decades before that.
By immediately appointing Muqrin as his heir, subject to the approval of a family Allegiance Council, Salman has moved to avert widespread speculation about the immediate path of the royal succession in the world's top oil exporter.
King Abdullah, who came to power in 2005, is seen here with Queen Elizabeth during a state banquet in his honour in 2007
King Abdullah was born in 1924 in Riyadh, one of the dozens of sons of Saudi Arabia's founder, King Abdul-Aziz Al Saud.
He only had a rudimentary education, and had a strict upbringing - exemplified by three days he spent in prison as a young man as punishment by his father for failing to give his seat to a visitor, a violation of Bedouin hospitality.
Abdullah was selected as crown prince in 1982 on the day his half-brother Fahd ascended to the throne.
The decision was challenged by a full brother of Fahd, Prince Sultan, who wanted the title for himself.
But the family eventually closed ranks behind Abdullah to prevent splits.
By the time he became de facto regent in 1995, when his predecessor King Fahd had a stroke, he was known to foreign diplomats as devout and conservative with strong ties to the kingdom's Bedouin tribes.
Prime Minister David Cameron receives the King Abdullah Decoration One from King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia at the Palace of the King in Jeddah
King Abdullah sought to modernise the ultraconservative Muslim kingdom with incremental but significant reforms, including nudging open greater opportunities for women during his 10-year reign.
The King, who acquired a stutter as a child, was also a strong supporter education, building universities at home and increasing scholarships abroad for Saudi students.
He hoped to build a more skilled workforce in a country where more than half of the 20million-strong population is under the age of 25.
However, he and fellow Sunni Arab monarchs also staunchly opposed the Middle East's wave of pro-democracy uprisings, seeing them as a threat to stability and their own rule.
King Abdullah with Prince Charles at the start of his 2007 state visit
King Abdullah and Prince Philip during the same 2007 visit
Despite being allied with America, Abdullah was not afraid to push against them.
When he was regent, he pressed Washington to withdraw the troops it had deployed in the kingdom since the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. The U.S. finally did so in 2003.
In 2000, Abdullah convinced the Arab League to approve an unprecedented offer that all Arab states would agree to peace with Israel if it withdrew from lands it captured in 1967.
The next year, he sent his ambassador in Washington to tell the Bush administration that it was too unquestioningly biased in favor of Israel and that the kingdom would from now on pursue its own interests apart from Washington's.
Bush soon after advocated for the first time the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
Pope Benedict XVI and King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud met in 2007 - the first ever meeting between a Pope and a reigning Saudi king
After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Abdullah was forced to negotiate tricky waters: 15 of the 19 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia, while many pointed out that the baseline ideology for al-Qaida and other groups stemmed from Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi interpretation of Islam.
But when the militants began a wave of violence in the country in 2003, aimed at toppling the monarchy, Abdullah cracked down hard.
For the next three years, security forces battled militants, finally forcing them to flee to neighboring Yemen.
There, they created a new al-Qaida branch, and Saudi Arabia has played a behind-the-scenes role in fighting it.
The late Saudi king - pictured here with President Obama in 2010 - had been in hospital since December
The Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia reveals on its website that King Abdullah 'retained a love of the desert, along with a love of horsemanship' throughout his life.
He is also said to have loved to read, establishing two libraries, the King Abdulaziz Library in Riyadh, and one in Casablanca, Morocco.
King Abdullah was admitted to the King Abdulaziz Medical City of the National Guard in Riyadh in December to undergo medical tests, according to state media.
The royal court earlier this month said that the king was suffering from pneumonia and had temporarily needed help to breathe through a tube, but that the procedure was successful.
Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud wears traditional clothing, with a sabre, and the 'khanjar', a curved Arab dagger, in preparation of performing the traditional Bedouin war dance using swords called the 'Ardha' on January, in 2003
His death was rumoured earlier today, however a member of the royal family took to social media to say reports of his death were premature.
'All that is being reported about King Abdullah's death is far from the truth,' Ibrahem al-Rawsa, identified as a journalist at state-run Saudi Press Agency, wrote on his Twitter account.
A member of the royal family wrote: 'I give you good news. The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques is fine and there is no truth to the rumours going around.'
He was referring to King Abdullah's official title.
King Salamn - who is now at the head of the world's top oil producing country - had recently taken over the ailing monarch's responsibilities.
King Salman has been part of the ruling clique of princes for decades and is thought likely to continue the main thrusts of Saudi strategic policy, including maintaining the alliance with the United States and working towards energy market stability.
During his five decades as Riyadh governor he was reputedly adept at managing the delicate balance of clerical, tribal and princely interests that determine Saudi policy, while maintaining good relations with the West.
The new king Salman, pictured here last year, is thought to be likely to continue the main thrusts of his half-brother's policies
In the long term Saudi rulers have to manage the needs of a rapidly growing population plagued by structural unemployment, and an economy that remains overly dependent on oil revenue and undermined by lavish subsidies.
Saudi Arabia, which holds more than a fifth of the world's crude oil, also exerts some influence over the world's 1.6billion Muslims through its guardianship of Mecca and Medina, Islam's holiest sites.
Most senior members of the ruling al-Saud family are thought to favour similar positions on foreign and energy policy, but incoming kings have traditionally chosen to appoint new ministers to head top ministries like oil and finance.
In a country where the big ministries are dominated by royals, successive kings have kept the oil portfolio reserved for commoners and insisted on maintaining substantial spare output capacity to help reduce market volatility.
