Saudi men banned from marrying Pakistani women

New law also bars men from marrying women from Bangladesh, Chad and Burma


Web Desk August 06, 2014

Saudi Arabia has imposed a new law banning Saudi men from marrying women from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Chad and Burma, Morocco World News reported.

The law also imposes restrictive rules on men marrying Moroccan women.

Quoting Saudi daily Makkah newspaper, the report states that “Saudis will not be able to marry citizens of four nationalities,” naming Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma and Chad as the four nations.

The director of Makkah police, Major General Assaf Qureshi told the Saudi paper that marriage requests from outside Saudi Arabia are made through official procedures under very strict terms. One of the restrictions is that the age gap between the couple cannot exceed 25 years.

In order to marry outside the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Saudis must submit an application to a government committee and wait for their approval or rejection. The applications can take a long time to be processed.

The government has not given any official statement clarifying the new restrictions on marrying foreigners.

COMMENTS (147)

Mohammad iqbal | 1 year ago | Reply

It is good that Saudi govt stops Saudi men marrying Pakistani ladies. We Pakistanis are very proud to be a Pakistani and not Arab

Qasim | 9 years ago | Reply I am Saudi and live in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi government banning Saudis marriage to Pakistani girls is not meant to offend Any one, but due to abuses by some Saudi citizens that turns to very bitter family disputes. Additionally, many Saudi girls can not get married as a result of allowing citezens marry muslim Pakistani girls. This is not an offense to Pakistani sisters and not to be understood as racial discrimination. The other fact that Arabs or Saudis look to Pakistanis downward is not true in the racial context. The majority of the Asian workers (Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladishes, ...etc) are low education and do not have much knowledge of the Arab culture. This causes a lot of cultural conflicts and misconceptions resulting in stereotype similar to some of the comments that I can see here.
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