Women Can Now Stay in Hotels Without Male Guardians, Saudi Officials Say
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}
Women in Saudi Arabia can now stay in a hotel or a furnished apartment without a male guardian according to decision by the Ministry of Trade, reported the local press Monday.
The daily Al-Watan, which is deemed close to the Saudi government, said the ministry issued a circular to the hotels asking them to accept women in their rooms even if they were alone provided that all their information immediately be to a police station in the area.
The decision was adopted after a study conducted by the Interior Ministry, the Supreme Commission of Tourism and the religious police authority known as the Commission for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}
Saudi women, under strict Islamic law, suffer severe restrictions on daily life as they are not allowed to be anywhere with an unrelated man, cannot drive, appear before a judge without a male representative, or travel abroad without a male guardian's permission.
The paper interviewed some Saudi women who complained that they had been severely inconvenienced by the rules banning them from staying in the hotels alone.
It quoted a woman identified as saying that she once arrived late at night at King Fahd airport on an internal flight and was denied a hotel room because she was alone.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}
Another woman, Fatima Ibrahim, said her son-in-law quarreled with his wife and daughters and threw them out of the house. When they tried to get a hotel room, they were asked to get a permission from the police.