RIYADH: Denied the right to travel without consent from their male guardians and banned from driving, women in Saudi Arabia are now monitored by an electronic system that tracks any cross-border movements.
Since last week, Saudi women's male guardians began receiving text messages on their phones informing them when women under their custody leave the country, even if they are travelling together.
Manal al-Sherif, who became the symbol of a campaign launched last year urging Saudi women to defy a driving ban, began spreading the information on Twitter, after she was alerted by a couple.
The husband, who was travelling with his wife, received a text message from the immigration authorities informing him that his wife had left the international airport in Riyadh.
"The authorities are using technology to monitor women," said columnist Badriya al-Bishr, who criticised the "state of slavery under which women are held" in the ultra-conservative kingdom.
Women are not allowed to leave the kingdom without permission from their male guardian, who must give his consent by signing what is known as the "yellow sheet" at the airport or border.
The move by the Saudi authorities was swiftly condemned on social network Twitter - a rare bubble of freedom for millions in the kingdom - with critics mocking the decision.
"Hello Taliban, herewith some tips from the Saudi e-government!" read one post.
"Why don't you cuff your women with tracking ankle bracelets too?" wrote Israa.
"Why don't we just install a microchip into our women to track them around?" joked another.
"If I need an SMS to let me know my wife is leaving Saudi Arabia, then I'm either married to the wrong woman or need a psychiatrist," tweeted Hisham.
"This is technology used to serve backwardness in order to keep women imprisoned," said Bishr, the columnist.
"It would have been better for the government to busy itself with finding a solution for women subjected to domestic violence" than track their movements into and out of the country.
Saudi Arabia applies a strict interpretation of sharia, or Islamic law, and is the only country in the world where women are not allowed to drive.
In June 2011, female activists launched a campaign to defy the ban, with many arrested for doing so and forced to sign a pledge they will never drive again.
No law specifically forbids women in Saudi Arabia from driving, but the interior minister formally banned them after 47 women were arrested and punished after demonstrating in cars in November 1990.
Last year, King Abdullah - a cautious reformer - granted women the right to vote and run in the 2015 municipal elections, a historic first for the country.
In January, the 89-year-old monarch appointed Sheikh Abdullatif Abdel Aziz al-Sheikh, a moderate, to head the notorious religious police commission, which enforces the kingdom's severe version of sharia law.
Following his appointment, Sheikh banned members of the commission from harassing Saudi women over their behaviour and attire, raising hopes a more lenient force will ease draconian social constraints in the country.
But the kingdom's "religious establishment" is still to blame for the discrimination of women in Saudi Arabia, says liberal activist Suad Shemmari.
"Saudi women are treated as minors throughout their lives even if they hold high positions," said Shemmari, who believes "there can never be reform in the kingdom without changing the status of women and treating them" as equals to men.
But that seems a very long way off.
The kingdom enforces strict rules governing mixing between the sexes, while women are forced to wear a veil and a black cloak, or abaya, that covers them from head to toe except for their hands and faces.
The many restrictions on women have led to high rates of female unemployment, officially estimated at around 30 percent.
In October, local media published a justice ministry directive allowing all women lawyers who have a law degree and who have spent at least three years working in a lawyer's office to plead cases in court.
But the ruling, which was to take effect this month, has not been implemented.
COMMENTS (28)
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@iPhone: See.. u keep on making my point valid that using brain is a waste of time (if one is iphone)... u just tried to respond in a manner to have maximum insulting effect and for that, you just couldn't find anything else but my sentence structure. Now that shows your mentality and tolerance level. Pathetic...is what i can say for u now:( You seriously lack in cognitive skills
Sheikhs-peer Reborn (Iphone) ;)
Even if you leave basic human rights for a second, how ignorant about Islam could you get if you think this act in any way upholds the spirit of this religion? This is a constraint through and through. Whoever disagrees believes that oppressing women is a noble thing, which I should point out is just beyond sad.
@jahandad: There is more peace in grave yard. There was more peace in Soviet Union.
@MK: Thanks
They fleece us during the hajj and umra, and you say that there is no corruption there. What they have are the best censors in the world and as some just said petro dollars add to that a constant stream of tourist who spen forex there so they can afford to pay their people peanuts to keep quiet. But have they really developed anything that can be called their own innovation or invention or creation or induustry which compete at an international level.
@ADEEL: Enforcing any form of restriction falls under the category of "constraint."
Now Saudi women will feel even more Liberated. The abaya was not enough.
@ADEEL; It is a constraint if you are trying to escape from an abusive psycho
@jahandad: How is KSA not corrupt, when there are thousands of princes receiving large sums of money from the government for doing nothing? This is the money of the country and it's people, not the birth right of the royals.
In terms of crime, the state is regularly committing crimes against their people by denying them their human rights.
thank God for Pakistan- at least we arent as bad as Saudi arabia
@jahandad: Two words: petro dollars.
NO one in pakistan or india ,bangladesh ,nepal has the moral rights of cririsizing ksa...why ?bcz, ksa is more peaceful than any other country in the whole wold,,best police with zero corruption rate,less crime than entire world countries ,,,you can travel alone in the night with a million dollars in your pocket without any fear of thieves..,,,,THE only thieves and criminals are bangalis and some other expat illetrate badoos,,,,,,I KNOW ALLthis bcz i have spent my life among them for a long time,,,the people of saudi arabia have best social benefits than usa europe or japan,,,,,salaries of saudis are far superior to american,,,,,etc ,,for example an american male nurse salary in usa is average 2000-to 3000 dollars ,while a saudi male nurse in saudia takes bet 4000 to 6000 us dollars,,,treatment is free for all saudis , free home loans and car loans ,,,more than 70% saudis enjoyes zero meter land cruizers ,bmws mercedes , fords, caprices etc whicch many american can only dreams of,,,,,,,,,,,,,NOW COME TO ASIA ,,,,,corruption everywhere, crimes everywhere,,,bad people enjoys all percks while good people only suffer,,,,,,,,,,,,AND above all ksa is having 7 million asian who feeds roughly more than 50 million asians backs,,,,,,,, YES WE DONOT HAVE ANY MORAL GROUNDS TO CRTISIZE THEM,,,,,,,,,,,
Stop pretending that Arab culture is not Muslim culture. Some of it isn't, but 95% of it is.
@iPhone: Your first comment was good enough. I recommended it. But correcting people's English in a country where it is a second language makes you a bit of the loser. (As well as having "iPhone" for a username. Also, a bit loser-ly). Sorry, bud.
@VINOD: Agree with most of your post but it is important not to confuse Arab Customs with Islamic Customs. Modern day Arabs are following many pre Islamic ways in the name if Islam.
i dont agree with the driving ban but husbands should know when their wives leave the country..... How is this constraint???
@Amad Khan: I really wish you could learn the art of constructing a sentence in coherent English. sigh. What a loser.
How much I wish, we had these electronic gadgets 1400 years ago. Would have lessened all the spilling of blood. Or bad blood.
The right Mard...how u know what i think:o u r a mind reader my friend
No no dont get sad iphone, read between the lines:) u pour too much emotions in feeling sorry and made ur brain shutup;)
@Amad Khan: Amad, I feel sorry for you. You seem to be one of those Saudi apologists. Please, grow up.
@Amad Khan
You are right Ahmed. You think it is a wonderful innovation that should be applied here too?
Wow people are so worried about rights in other countries....Irony;)
This is applied for all expats working in the gulf and under sponsorship.
Sad thing is not what is happening in Saudi because what is happening there is happening from ages. What is really sad is that many people in Pakistan want to travel backward in time and shun the education and freedom achieved by Muslims of this subcontinent during Mogul and British rule. They also want to shun the path of modern education shown to them by Sir Syed, Quiad and Iqbal. They are keen to ape Saudi in every way and think that it is the way Pakistan should travel. The joke is that many ape the Arab customs, attire, way of speaking and some think that they are not the same stock as the people of this subcontinent but are Arabs.
The Saudis (not all, but many) have the gall to call independent women as 'immoral' and 'objectified', while the country effectively treats 50% of its population as cattle or property.
I thought this was a joke but this is actually very much real. Leave it to these badoos to make their women as good as the camels in their country though I would not be surprised if the camels in Saudi Arabia have more rights than women. What a sad and insecure lot these Saudis are.