SAUDI ARABIA: Woman accuses driver of rape amid growing campaign against women's driving ban

Over the last weeks there has been a growing campaign to allow women to drive for themselves in ultraconservative Saudi Arabia -- the only country in the world which prohibits women from driving and where women are forced to hire male drivers or taxis to move around.

Saudi authorities have responded to the call by clamping down on those allegedly behind the campaign and blocking a Facebook page that promoted allowing women to drive in Saudi Arabia.

The campaign for lifting the women's driving ban in Saudi Arabia is likely to intensify after a Saudi businesswoman accused her driver of raping her at gunpoint.

According to an article published in the Saudi daily Okaz on Wednesday, her driver pulled over the vehicle in an industrial area of the holy city of Medina in western Saudi Arabia and raped her while pointing a gun at her. The woman, whose name was not disclosed in the report, reported the attack and the driver has been arrested.

The news comes as activists have called on women who have international driving licenses to get behind the wheel and drive their cars on June 17 in protest of Saudi Arabia's ban. The activists insist that the driving ban is based on conservative traditions and call for a change in the law so Saudi women can obtain licenses and drive themselves instead of having to rely on male drivers.

The campaign quickly gained momentum after its launch, attracting thousands of supporters on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter last month. Several Saudi women came out driving their own cars, including a woman who drove her car around for several days in the Red Sea port city of Jidda.

Then came the case of 32-year-old Manal Sharif, who posted a video of herself driving her car in the eastern city of Khobar. In the clip, posted below, she talks about the issues and complications that result from banning female drivers and presents her arguments for why women should be able to drive.

 

A day after Sharif posted the clip to YouTube, she was arrested by Saudi authorities on May 22 on the accusation of inciting women to defy the driving ban. She was detained for 10 days and was released earlier this week.

Sharif's lawyer told Agence France-Presse that his client had called upon Saudi King Abdullah to release her and said he hoped her case would be closed.

Thousands of people joined Facebook groups set up in support of Sharif.

--Alexandra Sandels in Beirut

Photo: A Saudi woman gets out of a car after having been given a ride by her driver in the Saudi capital Riyadh in May. Credit: Agence- France Presse.  Video credit: YouTube

Comments

[DOROTHY DAISY PASCUAL-GULESCI]

Yes, i strongly agree with Manal Sharif that women should drive and not to depend with male driver. i am experiencing many problems with that. i am married to a very busy businessman and i am working in the morning and he is working in the night. when he is about to sleep he have to send me to my work. and it was very very difficult, we always have agrument about it. i do hope that this campaign will succeed very soon.

I ussually drive in my own country to work at about 1.5 hours far and and i have drivers license, so i thnk it is about time to let women drive. and they must the advantages of letting women drive instead to force their children at around 10 years old to drive for them and ussually the cause of road traffic accidents and injuries for young children.

Women driving is more safe than children and specially women who are educated.

i think saudi women now are now going far ahead in a civilized world.

i just hope that women can get driver's license if there are qualified to have and be able to drive in this country.

[lala]

Silly law, man should grow some backbone, if women cant drive cars then they should take to camels. IS that banned too? Let them try and explain that away

[crazyprofessor]

The problem is that they want to come here (santa barbara) and live like it's there.

[woobie]

While the rape of any human being is deplorable anytime it is also a worldwide issue.

The driving restriction rights issue is a very culturally challenged law in the first place, @jimiwuzairborne, but it it isn't a Human rights abuse or outright war crime as seen in Israel, Syria, Yemen,Libya, China etc... is it.

[Dean Blake]

This is the beginning of someting big in SA. Next is accidents, and lawsuits, and courtrooms where women are not allowed to testify as witnesses on their own behalf!! A man's testimony counts double that of a woman's!!

Where is my wife? Which one!! they all took off in your car!

The whole of Saudi society can change on just this one issue. Its a finger in the dike issue, no pun intended.

[JimiWuzAirborne]

I am a little dismayed that the message boards are so empty for such incredible stories. I am willing to bet if any of the above was going on in Israel there would be hundreds of comments on here. Funny how abusing human beings in the Middle East is only deplorable when it is "witnessed" in Israel.

[Angela Birch]

I have long wondered why a nation that is so "prtective " of the women in their country insists that to get around they must get into a car usually driven by a strange man an effectively be at the mercy of the man. It would be so much safer for the woman for her to be in her own car which she could lock by herself or with other women friends to go shopping or to drive her children to school.

I suspect that the real reason is because some of the leaders of the vice and Virtue squads believe every woman not confined to her home on a short leash is out looking for illicit sex. They have no faith in women of the muslim faith being virtuous.

Not much faith in their beliefs at all.

I am glad I don't belong to a faith that seemingly mandates that women be insatiable. Too much effort. Being a non believer I can devote myself to my husband of 36 years. Being a non believer he can devote himself to only one wife. It works out very well.