Assistants to Saudi Arabia's Prince Turki bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud's physically assaulted two staff members of The Crimson seeking to take pictures for a report on their activities in Cambridge this weekend, according to reports by Crimson staff and one eyewitness.

In addition, one of the Crimson staffers said that a close aide to the prince had verbally threatened his life in an earlier incident two weeks ago. All three incidents were observed by either Harvard or Cambridge police officers who declined to respond to the students' requests for assistance, said the reporter, Joshua A. Gerstein '91-92.

Crimson President Jonathan S. Cohn '91 said yesterday that the officers' inaction on these occasions appeared to be a violation of police procedure and that the newspaper intends to file complaints with appropriate city and University officials.

An aide to the prince told Gerstein this weekend that the prince's security guards had acted because Gerstein and a fellow photographer were bothering the prince's party.

Shortly after 2 p.m. Saturday, a security agent for the prince kicked Crimson photographer William H. Bachman '92 in the midsection and threatened to injure another photographer if he continued to take pictures from the sidewalk in front of the hotel, according to Bachman and Gerstein.

Gerstein said that when he asked a Harvard police officer on the guard detail to take a report, the officer replied, "How do you know I'm a Harvard police officer?" and walked inside the hotel.

Gerstein said that the attack had taken place well within the officer's field of view. He and South Dartmouth resident Michael J. Sylvia, 37, said they had witnessed the attack.

"I saw a couple of guys taking pictures of a guy who didn't want his picture taken. He approached one of the guys taking pictures and kicked him," Sylvia said in an interview yesterday. "It was pretty hard. He was pretty angry."

"He just went off, he just lost it," Sylvia said.

Sylvia said he was about 30 feet away from Bachman at the time of the attack.

Earlier in the afternoon, at about 1:30 p.m., Cambridge police officers failed to respond after a member of the prince's staff followed Gerstein through a nearby park and pushed his camera into his face, Gerstein said.

Gerstein, who said he was taking pictures of members of the prince's family and approximately 15 security people accompanying them, said he asked the officers to take a report on the assault. The officers refused to do so and denied having witnessed the incident, he said.

When another police officer assigned to investigate the incident entered the hotel with the photographer, officers who had been present at the time of the attack declined to provide their names and then denied having been in the park, Gerstein said.

Gerstein said that during an earlier visit to the hotel, the prince's top aide, Dr. Mustafa Aziz, threatened his life for taking pictures of Aziz in front of the hotel. According to Gerstein, Aziz rushed toward him and shouted, "Take pictures of me, I shoot you."

Gerstein said that he felt threatened by Aziz, but that he did not believe his life was in immediate danger.