Saudi Arabia has sacked a number of senior officials at tourism projects, including the historic northwestern site Al Ula and Red Sea mega-projects on suspicion of corruption, Saudi news agency SPA reported early on Friday, citing a royal decree.

The investigation focused on whether the officials facilitated the encroachment of lands that belong to these projects, SPA reported.

The sacked officials include the governors of Amlaj and Al Wajh, coastal cities in the north of the kingdom, the head of border security and officials at the interior ministry and other government entities.

They are under investigation by the anti-corruption authority, NAZAHA, Arabic for integrity, suspected of facilitating encroachment of more than 5,000 land plots at the Red Sea mega-project and dozens of plots at the historic city of Al Ula and the Al Souda project in the southwestern city of Abha.

Scores of the kingdom’s economic and political elite were detained in 2017 at Riyadh’s Ritz-Carlton hotel in a corruption crackdown that unsettled some foreign investors.

The royal court said last year it was winding down that campaign after 15 months, but the authorities later said they would start going after graft by ordinary government employees.

The royal order stipulated the following:

1. Termination of the service of Lieutenant General Awad bin Eid bin Awdah Al Balawi (Director General of the Border Guard) by referring him to retirement.
2. Sacking the governors of Amlaj, Al Wajh, and the head of the Souda Center.
3. Sacking commanders of the border guards sector in Amlaj and Al Wajh.
4. Sacking the person responsible for infringements and his deputy in the Ministry of the Interior, and those responsible for infringements in the emirates (Medina, Tabuk, and Asir).
5. Firing the mayor of Tabuk region and mayors of: Amlaj, Al Wajh and Al Souda.
6. Firing the official responsible for infringements in the secretariats of the Medina and Tabuk regions.
7. The Ministries of Interior, Municipal and Rural Affairs, and the emirates of the Medina, Tabuk and Asir shall be granted a period of one month from its date to remove all infringements.
8. Anti-Corruption Commission shall immediately investigate all the officials mentioned above about their responsibility for the above-mentioned infringements, and take the legal procedures against them.