New leaks haunt Trump

The White House announced a huge arms deal with Saudi Arabia yesterday as President Donald Trump took his first steps on the world stage, looking to leave mounting troubles behind at home.

The $110 billion deal for Saudi purchases of US defence equipment and services came at the start of an eight-day foreign tour that will also take Trump to Jerusalem, the Vatican and meetings with leaders in Europe.

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The US president was given a warm welcome in the oil-rich kingdom -- a mood in sharp contrast to Washington where pressure is building after fresh claims over his team's alleged links to Moscow.

Air Force One had barely taken off when it was announced late on Friday that James Comey, the former FBI chief fired by Trump, had agreed to testify publicly about Russian interference in the US elections.

Reports also emerged that Trump had called Comey "a nut job" and that the FBI had identified a senior White House official as a "significant person of interest" in its probe of Russian meddling.

The president and first lady Melania Trump were welcomed by Saudi King Salman as they disembarked at King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh on Saturday morning.

Trump and his wife, who dressed conservatively in black but did not cover her hair as Saudi women are required to do, walked side-by-side to the tarmac where they both shook hands with the 81-year-old king.

After a welcoming coffee ceremony, Trump and his entourage were brought to the royal court where the president was awarded the Collar of Abdulaziz Al Saud, Saudi Arabia's highest civilian honour.

The arms sale agreement was just one of a series of deals to be announced during the visit, with US conglomerate General Electric saying it had also signed agreements and memorandums of understanding worth $15 billion.

"This package of defence equipment and services support the long-term security of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region in the face of Iranian threats," a White House official said in announcing the deal.

Trump held talks with Salman and was to meet the kingdom's two powerful crown princes later, before giving a speech on Islam to leaders of Muslim countries today.

For Riyadh the visit is an opportunity to rebuild ties with a key ally, strained under Trump's predecessor Barack Obama who Sunni Arab Gulf states suspected of a tilt towards their Shiite regional rival Iran.

A more muted focus on human rights should also please Washington's traditional Sunni Gulf allies, analysts say.

Today's speech to dozens of Muslim leaders has been touted as a major event -- along the lines of a landmark address to the Islamic world given by Obama in Cairo in 2009.

The speech will be especially sensitive given tensions sparked by the Trump administration's attempted travel ban targeting several Muslim majority nations and accusations of anti-Islamic rhetoric on the campaign trail.

Trump wants Gulf states in particular to do more to tackle extremists such as the Islamic State jihadist group.

In return he is expected to take a harder line on Iran, where it was announced yesterday that President Hassan Rouhani had won a resounding re-election victory as voters overwhelmingly backed his efforts to reach out to the world.

Before departing, Trump tweeted he would be "strongly protecting American interests" on his trip.

While most US presidents make their first foreign trip to neighbouring Canada or Mexico, 70-year-old Trump has opted instead for the Middle East and Europe.

He travels to Israel and the Palestinian Territories tomorrow and Tuesday, and then to the Vatican and to Brussels and Italy for Nato and G7 meetings.

The tour has been billed as a chance to visit places sacred to the three major monotheistic religions -- Islam, Judaism and Christianity.

But it is also fraught with peril for the real estate magnate, who is known to dislike lengthy travel.

The avalanche of revelations in the run-up to his departure has eroded Trump's standing at home.

On Friday, a report by The Washington Post that the probe into his campaign's Russia ties had identified a "significant person of interest" in the White House undercut Trump's insistence his election bid had nothing to do with the Kremlin.

US law enforcement uses the term "a person of interest" to mean someone who is part of a criminal investigation but not arrested or formally accused of a crime. The person may be cooperating or have information of use to investigators.

Separately the New York Times reported that Trump boasted to Russian officials at a White House meeting last week that firing Comey relieved "great pressure" the president faced from a law-enforcement probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

"I just fired the head of the FBI. He was crazy, a real nut job," Trump said, according to the Times, which cited a document summarizing the meeting and read to it by an unnamed US official.

"I faced great pressure because of Russia. That's taken off."

Trump met Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russia's ambassador to Washington in the Oval Office the day after Trump fired Comey, who was in charge of the Russia election probe.

The Times said the document was based on notes taken from inside the Oval Office. Reuters was not immediately able to verify the accuracy of that account.

The scandals have revived questions about his ability to strike a presidential tone with his foreign counterparts.

The first leg of the trip is likely to be the easiest -- Saudi leaders are keen to work with an administration they see as more in line with their goals.

The next leg in Israel be more complicated, despite the history of warm ties between Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The visit is already awash in controversy, from a row over Trump's planned visit to Jerusalem's Western Wall, the holiest prayer site for Jews, to his alleged disclosure of Israeli intelligence to Russian officials.

After meeting Netanyahu in Jerusalem, Trump will see Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in Bethlehem, part of his efforts to revive the long-stagnant peace process.