NOVANEWS
Saudi authorities extended the detention of two women’s rights activists, one of whom tried to drive into the kingdom in defiance of a ban, Amnesty International said on Tuesday.
Saudi Arabia, a key US ally, is the only country in the world which does not allow women to drive.
Loujain Hathloul and Maysaa Alamoudi will be detained for 25 more days, the London-based watchdog said in a statement.
“Jailing a woman for simply driving a car is preposterous,” Said Boumedouha, Amnesty’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, was quoted saying in the statement.
The Interior Ministry has still not commented on the case of the two women.
Border officers stopped Hathloul when she tried to drive from neighboring United Arab Emirates (UAE) into Saudi Arabia on November 30.
Alamoudi, a UAE-based Saudi journalist, later arrived to support her.
Both activists were arrested and are being held in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province.
Relatives of the two women declined to comment on Tuesday.
Hathloul was trying to make a point in her unusual attempt to drive through the border and knew that she would not be allowed to pass, an activist has told AFP.
Activists started a petition calling for the release of Hathloul and Alamoudi.
Women drivers in the kingdom have previously been arrested and cars have been confiscated but the detention of Hathloul is already among the longest given to any female driver in the kingdom recently, activists told AFP.
Activists say women’s driving is not actually against the law, and the ban is linked to tradition and custom ultra-conservative Wahhabi nation, and not backed by Islamic text or judicial ruling.
Some leading members of the country’s powerful Wahhabi clergy have argued against women being allowed to drive, which they say could lead to them mingling with unrelated men, thereby breaching strict gender segregation rules.
Last November the kingdom’s top cleric, Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah al-Sheikh, said the female driving prohibition protects society from “evil” and should not be a major concern.
In October, dozens of women drove and posted images of themselves doing so as part of an online campaign supporting the right to drive.
They also circulated an online petition asking the Saudi government to “lift the ban on women driving” in a move that attracted more than 2,400 signatures ahead of the campaign’s culmination on October 26.
“The issue is not that of simply a vehicle driven by a woman, but the acknowledgement and recognition of the humanity of half of society and the God-given rights of women,” the petition states.
Last year, activists also focused their demands on October 26 – which they call a “symbolic” date as part of efforts to press for women’s right to drive.
In response, the interior ministry said it would “strictly implement” measures against anyone undermining “the social cohesion.”
Women who have defied the law in the past have been harassed by compatriots and run into trouble with the authorities as they would be arrested and have their cars confiscated.
In 2013, a woman was arrested for driving her diabetic father to the hospital.
In 2011, activist Manal al-Sharif, one of the organizers of October 26 campaign, was arrested and held nine days for posting online a video of herself behind the wheel.
That year Saudi police arrested a number of women who defied the driving ban and forced them to sign a pledge not to drive again.
In 1990, authorities stopped 47 women who got behind the wheel in a demonstration against the driving ban.
Late October, the UN Human Rights Council urged Saudi Arabia to crack down on discrimination against women among other rights abuses.
The council had already adopted a report listing 225 recommendations for improvements a couple of days earlier in Geneva during a Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the oil-rich kingdom’s rights record.
Many of the UN recommendations called on Riyadh to abolish a system requiring women to seek permission from male relatives to work, marry or leave the country, and one urged it to lift the driving ban.
The Wahhabi kingdom has strict policies segregating genders in public spaces and restricting women’s freedoms.
In late November, a number of restaurants in Saudi Arabia decided to ban women “without a male custodian” from their premises.
Discriminatory signs, reminiscent of anti-black racism, reading “Women are not allowed” were spotted outside restaurants across the kingdom.
Currently all nine million Saudi women, regardless of economic and social status, are prohibited from studying, traveling, working, accessing governmental institutions, undergoing medical treatment or surgical procedures including childbirth, without the consent of their male guardians.
According to a number of activists, these restrictions on freedom of movement and access to basic human rights as a result of such rigorously imposed rules have led to the death of a number of Saudi women which could have otherwise been avoided.
Hardline clerics protested when King Abdullah, in January last year, decided to give women a 20 percent quota in the previously all-male Shura Council of 150 members.
The Shura Council is appointed by the king and advises the monarch on policy, but cannot legislate.
Riyadh has taken a zero tolerance approach to all attempts at protest or dissent in the kingdom, including by liberal rights activists, Islamists, and members of the Shia minority.
