RIYADH (AFP) - The editor of leading Saudi newspaper Al-Watan has been fired after a columnist angered the interior minister in an exchange over the countrys religious police, journalists said on Saturday. Jamal Khashoggi, one of the countrys most prominent journalists, was sacked from his position late Friday, Al-Watan writer Khalid al-Ghannami confirmed. The firing came after a columnist for the newspaper upset powerful Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz on Tuesday by questioning the power of the countrys religious police, the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. It was the second time that Khashoggi has been fired from the job. In 2003 he was forced out for a lengthy period after the paper ran an article critical of an ancient cleric important to Wahhabism. The latest incident took place on Tuesday after a ceremony marking the contract for a new management study for the committee, also known as the muttawa. During the ceremony Nayef, who wields immense power in the kingdom and is believed second in line for the throne, praised the work of the muttawa, despite their immense unpopularity with the Saudi urban public. According to reports the Al-Watan writer asked Nayef after the ceremony why there are more muttawa offices than police offices in Riyadh. Nayef denied the claim and then strongly criticised Al-Watan for being disrespectful of religion and the country. Under Khashoggi Al-Watan has become one of the countrys most progressive newspapers, in recent years increasingly taking aim at the muttawa and the restrictions placed on Saudis by conservative clerics, including the ban on women driving and the lack of women in high positions. A former diplomat close to Prince Turki al-Faisal, the influential ex-Saudi Ambassador to Washington, Khashoggi was the only Saudi among six journalists invited to interview US President Barack Obama during his landmark visit to Cairo on June 4.