Word: saudi
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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This decision is based on the case of a Saudi Arabian woman who left her home country in April 1991 to further her education. Initially, this woman was denied refugee status in Canada...
...interview with The New York Times, the woman, who asked to remain unnamed, said, "The situation [in Saudi Arabia] will become more and more unbearable, and then it will explode because the condition of repression of human beings can't continue forever." She was referring to the mixture of Islamic and conservative Arab traditions in which women are forbidden to travel alone or drive and must be veiled in public...
Furthermore, the woman complained about the restrictions on her autonomy in Saudi Arabia, where "you have to have permission of a man when you want to study, go to a friend's house, work, travel, everything...
Recall, for instance, the demonstration that took place in a Riyadh supermarket during the buildup to the Gulf War in November 1990, when seventy women from prominent Saudi families dismissed their chauffeurs and drove by themselves in protest of the driving restrictions...
That things are horrible for women in Saudi Arabia isn't surprising, at least for those familiar with strongly patriarchal societies. What is interesting, however, is the reason underlying the persistence of gender discrimination in these kinds of places...