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Somalina

Made in Saudi Arabia

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Somalina   

Adiga yaa wax ku weydiinaayo horta aa ka horeyso. Coffee shopkaan ogaa ayaad ka qaraabataa adigoo kabahii aan arkey wata. :D

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Human Rights Watch Sees Saudi Arabia Suppressing Rights of Millions

 

 

RUSSELS, Jan 24, 2011 (AFP) -- Saudi Arabia suppresses or fails to protect the rights of millions of women, foreign workers and Shiites, and reforms have so far been largely symbolic, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Monday (24 January).

 

“Authorities continue to systematically suppress or fail to protect the rights of nine million Saudi women and girls, eight million foreign workers, and some two million Shiite citizens,” HRW said in its annual report for 2010.

 

And “each year, thousands of people receive unfair trials or are subject to arbitrary detention,” said the report released in Brussels.

 

It listed individual curbs on freedoms affecting residents, particularly on women, whose ability to work, marry, study or travel lies in the hands of male guardians.

 

The group criticised the kingdom`s failure to fulfill a 2009 pledge to the UN Human Rights Council to end the male guardianship system, saying human rights remained poor in Saudi Arabia.

 

“Reforms to date have involved largely symbolic steps to improve the visibility of women and marginally expand freedom of expression,” the New York-based group said.

 

It cited one case of a court refusing to remove as guardian the father of a medical doctor in her 40s after her father refused to let her marry and had confiscated her income. The doctor now lives in a women`s shelter.

 

Another woman, Sawsan Salim, was sentenced to 300 lashes and 18 months prison for appearing in court without a male guardian, it added.

 

“The government has not yet set a minimum legal age for marriage, but in June issued new marriage contracts noting the bride`s age,” the report said, adding that one newspaper reported a divorced father marrying off his daughter, 12, for 80,000 riyals (21,300 dollars) because his ex-wife had gained custody.

 

“Asian embassies report thousands of complaints each year from domestic workers forced to work 15-20 hours a day, seven days a week, and denied their salaries,” the report said.

 

“Domestic workers frequently endure forced confinement, food deprivation and severe psychological, physical, and sexual abuse,” HRW said, adding that 8.3 million migrant workers legally live in Saudi Arabia.

 

Shiites in the kingdom are also a target of discrimination, it said.

 

“Official discrimination against Shiites encompasses religious practices, education, and the justice system. Government officials exclude Shiites from certain public jobs and policy questions and publicly disparage their faith.”

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Somalina   

Saudi Women `Launch Facebook Campaign` To Participate in Municipal Elections

 

Saudi%20women11_1.jpg

Veiled Saudi women talk on their BlackBerry phones at a shopping mall in Riyadh August 5, 2010.

 

 

A group of women has launched a Facebook campaign to encourage the authorities to give them increased opportunities to participate in the Municipal Councils.

 

The campaigners want to raise awareness to see more women involved in the councils. The campaign -- titled Baladi (or My Country) -- builds on the directives of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah who has called on the authorities to support women in all sectors.

 

Enam Al-Asfoor, a PR officer for the campaign, said women have the same rights as men and that more participation in elections would create better political awareness, which generates a feeling of responsibility and brings people closer to the decision-making process. She also said that women participating in elections would do much to challenge the negative stereotypes regarding Saudi women.

 

The campaign`s profile on Facebook, which was launched on Jan. 16, said Al-Asfoor, has so far attracted 1,525 members from across the Kingdom.

 

A number of programs have already been organized in various parts of the Kingdom to educate and raise awareness among women about elections and the role of the Municipal Councils.

 

“Building awareness and educating women is a gain even if we are not permitted to participate,” said Al-Asfoor.

 

Meanwhile, Zuhair Al-Harthy, a member of the Shoura Council, presented a recommendation to the council requesting that women be permitted to participate in the Municipal Council elections, at least through voting as a first step.

 

“I see no reason in preventing women from voting. The constitution does not differentiate between men and women in their rights and duties. The Ministry of Municipality`s report will be presented to the Shoura Council in the coming few weeks. Therefore, I have prepared recommendations to coincide with the report and be discussed in the council,” said Al-Harthy, adding that he is optimistic that it will be welcomed and approved.

 

He added that women have the capabilities and skills to take part in Municipal Councils. “I am optimistic that the Shoura Council will vote in favor of allowing women to vote in the elections,” said Al-Harthy, adding that women have the right to be part of the decision-making process as equal citizens.

 

Last October, Minister of Municipality Affairs Prince Mansour bin Miteb said in an interview that he has no reservations in allowing women to participate in the coming Municipal Council elections in 2011.

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Somalina   

US put pressure on Saudi Arabia to let women drive, leaked cables reveal

Documents given to WikiLeaks show Obama administration pushed Saudis to give female citizens more rights

 

David Leigh

guardian.co.uk Friday 27 May 2011 15.24 BST

 

Manal-al-Sharif--007.jpg

Manal al-Sharif in a still from the video of her driving that she posted on the internet. Her 'crime' has landed her in jail. Photograph: Manal al-Sharif

 

The Obama administration has been quietly putting pressure on Saudi Arabia to allow women to drive, according to leaked US embassy cables.

 

But the jailing of woman protester Manal al-Sharif after she posted an online video of herself at the wheel of a car in Khobar reveals the extent of US diplomatic failure regarding the ban.

 

The cables, part of the trove allegedly given to WikiLeaks by the US soldier Bradley Manning, reveal previously unreported clashes over women's rights.

 

Dispatches from Riyadh describe Saudi Arabia as "the world's largest women's prison". Those words are a quote from one female campaigner US diplomats have been in contact with, Wajeha al-Huwaider.

 

She too posted a video on YouTube in 2008 of herself driving. Saying millions of Saudi women were prisoners in their homes, she challenged male control over work and travel.

 

She regularly tries to take a taxi to neighbouring Bahrain: "Al-Huwaider is divorced which means under Saudi law her ex-husband or her father or a brother would need to give her permission to leave the country.

 

"Although she holds a valid passport, every time she tries to leave ... she is stopped at the border to Bahrain and turned around."

 

The billionaire tycoon Prince Waleed, a Saudi royal, assured a visiting Democrat congressman in July 2009 that King Abdullah did support women's rights, the embassy noted optimistically. The driving ban was reportedly about to be overturned.

 

Speaking at his 99-storey Kingdom Tower in Riyadh, Waleed said the ban was merely a "demeaning" tribal custom and that he "relished relating his run-ins with the kingdom's religious conservatives. He was involved with the first public showings of films in the kingdom in many years. His wife has openly requested that women be allowed to drive. He supports French president Sarkozy's campaign against women wearing coverings hiding their faces."

 

Abdullah appointed the country's first woman deputy minister in 2009 and opened "with much fanfare" a mixed-sex science university, in front of foreign dignitaries including Prince Andrew.

 

The embassy noted approvingly "several subtle, symbolic gestures ... Saudi men and women, many of whom did not wear the face-covering niqab, mingled freely with international attendees throughout the ceremony. Male and female students stood side by side on stage for an emotive reading of a poem. The ceremony was interspaced with a movie showing (uncovered) young girls and boys studying together".

 

But there was an immediate backlash. Saad Nasser al-Shithri, a cleric from the council of senior scholars, appeared on the Saudi religious TV channel to defy the king.

 

He denounced "mixing of the sexes" and "the teaching of deviant ideas such as evolution".

 

Abdullah was forced to sack him, but embassy contacts warned privately that Al-Shithri was being regarded as a hero by unemployed young Saudis, who resented foreign students getting advantages, and by reactionary clerics who feared a plot to impose western values.

 

Another cleric, Sheikh Salman al-Duwaysh, publicly attacked "mixing with women on the basis of claiming to educate them and to open the field for them to undertake jobs for which they were not created".

 

He said such women had "abandoned their basic duties such as housekeeping, bringing up children ... and replaced this by beautifying themselves and wantonness".

 

The embassy was refused consent for a US "rhythm and oratory duo" called Teasley and Williams to play to a mixed audience at the university.

 

But the duo did appear at the Riyadh literary society before "an unprecedented mixed-gender audience (mixed by Saudi standards – the handful of women who attended sat in a screened-off block of seats across the aisle from the men). Nonetheless, the fact that women were even invited to a musical performance with men in Riyadh is remarkable".

 

Obama's envoy, Richard Erdman, privately scolded Saudi ministers to little effect.

 

He "pointedly" told the notoriously reactionary interior minister, Prince Naif, that "no nation could prosper without the intellectual contributions and talent of all its citizens ... (ie women)".

 

He said the same to the deputy foreign minister, who responded wryly that "customs were a hard nut to crack".

 

In a dispatch headed Women Need Not Apply, US diplomats recorded that US-educated Prince Mansur, the minister of municipal affairs, firmly rejected the notion that political development required the participation of women saying issues such as women driving were "not fundamental to our society".

 

According to the US diplomats, the driving ban is in fact something of a charade which "dates from a 1991 fatwa issued by the late grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh Abdulaziz bin Baz. The grand mufti claimed that allowing women to drive would result in public 'mixing' of men and women, put women into dangerous situations because they could be alone in cars, and therefore result in social chaos".

 

The cable continued: "Women drive anyway: there are, in fact, many instances in which Saudi women defy the prohibition.

 

"Women drive on private property such as desert farms or residential compounds beyond reach of police.

 

"Embassy contacts and media report that in rural areas women routinely drive out of necessity, without being stopped.

 

"Al-Hayat newspaper reported 16 February ... a woman driving in some Saudi villages is considered normal."

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Taleexi   

Wallaahi waa duni aakhiru saban .. ma weli baa laysku haystaa naag baa gaari wadi karta iyo ma wadi karto.... it is just a matter of time... the earlier they figure out the better they all will be ... It makes economic sense if half of the population fire/terminate their drivers and get behind the wheel.

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bilan   

I would not mind moving to SA for few years and having a driver, as long as my stay over there is not permanent.

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