Flogged for driving a car

We may have all heard of the Arab Spring, but what about the Arab Women Driver's Spring?
It may be hard to believe, but in Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to drive cars - and can be flogged for doing so.
As recent news reports state, far from making moves towards reform, the new Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Nayef Bin Abdulaziz, is allegedly more hard-line on this issue, than even the reigning monarch. Saudi Clerics have even described allowing women to drive is the same as encouraging promiscuity.
Earlier in the year - fifty brave women braved the threats of severe punishment, got in their cars and drove around the capital. One woman, Shamia Jastinaya, has been sentenced to a flogging for breaking the driving ban on repeated occasions.
I have written before on my blog that freedom means more than just having parliamentary elections: Real liberty is about the rule of law, property rights and equality towards women.
Judging by it's extreme Islamist position on women drivers, Saudi ArabIa remains a country in an authoritarian backwater.
P.S. You can read more about this in yesterday's Times - behind the paywall or or here in The Daily Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/8930168/Allowing-women-drivers-in-Saudi-Arabia-will-be-end-of-virginity.html

The Saudi Embassy react to my Commons Motion about their links with SOAS: Student Rights responds

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Following the controversy highlighting the Student Rights Report on controversial links between SOAS and the Middle East - and my Commons Motion - the Saudi Embassy has written to MPs stating the following:


Open letter to MPs from HRH Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf Al Saud, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the UK.

"Honourable Members,

I wish to bring to your attention the Early Day Motion tabled by Robert Halfon MP in response to a document circulated by an organization called Student Rights questioning Saudi donations to SOAS.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has positive diplomatic and trade relations with the United Kingdom. Donations have been given by Saudi Arabia and the Royal Family and Saudi individuals to a range of educational organizations in the UK, including SOAS which is considered a premier educational institution. These donations have been voluntarily made and are a matter of record. If Saudi money is questionable then following a change in British law we will willingly abide by this and change our policy accordingly.

Questions have also been raised about the trustworthiness of Professor Muhammad Abdel Haleem who is the Director of the Centre of Islamic Studies at SOAS and the suggestion made that he is "untrustworthy" as he is on the Board of Trustees of the King Fahad Academy in Acton of which I am chairman. This is based on wrongful allegations made about the school in 2007 in the London Evening Standard. Following these allegations, the school was inspected twice by Ofsted – one of these visits being unannounced – and the allegations discredited. I refer you to the Ofsted report :-  which is publically available.

I would also point out that the academy has the approval of the International Baccalaureate for which it underwent a further rigorous inspection. Further, in the past year the academy has won a number of UK educational awards and Dr Sumaya Al Yusuf, Director of the Academy, has recently been appointed as Chairman of the International Schools Association in which the school takes a full part.

Mohammed N. Al Saud, Ambassador"
_______________________________________

Student Rights have responded as follows:

"A RESPONSE FROM THE DIRECTOR, RAHEEM KASSAM TO THE HRH PRINCE MOHAMMED BIN NAWAF AL SAUD, AMBASSADOR OF THE KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA TO THE UK

SIGN EDM 1933 TODAY

Honourable Members,

It has come to my attention that HRH the Ambassador of the Kingdom of Saudi
Arabia to the United Kingdom has responded to our report; on the Saudi Arabian Royal Family links to the School of Oriental and African Studies, one of London's major universities.

I would like to clarify for the benefit of Members who have seen the issue as reported here; , that while we appreciate the attempts by the Ambassador to engage on this issue, and note the importance placed on the report by the Embassy, the statement made regretfully does not address the key concerns raised.


Specifically, it should be noted:

1. The letter accepts the findings of the report in terms of the donations made and the Kingdom's relationship with many UK universities, but it does not address the concerns about human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia and how universities codes of conduct and governance principles are being breached by working with the Saudi regime.

2. The use of the word "untrustworthy" in quotation marks in the Ambassador's letter, in reference to Professor Haleem, would make it seem like our report used this terminology. We have not and we are confused by the use of quote marks here. We ask for clarification or a retraction from the Ambassador on this point.

3. The Ofsted reports that the Ambassador sent contain no references to the points made about the King Fahad Academy; contain no mention of the Evening Standard report and do little to allay the concerns expressed about this
institution.

4. Dr. Sumaya al-Yusuf, whom the Ambassador cites in his letter, was in fact the person responsible for confirming it; the claims about Christians being called "pigs" and Jews being called "apes" in textbooks at King Fahad Academy. She said: "We have these books in our school. I can't withdraw them." You can watch the whole clip here ; with further information here.

I do note however, that the Ambassador raises a valid point about the law with regard to university funding in this country, and encourage, as he clearly does, a full and open debate on this matter.

It cannot be a matter of course that our universities continue to rely on foreign governments and dictatorial regimes for funding, due to the implications of taking money from them, as noted previously here; (the quote on page two).

I urge all Honourable Members to sign EDM 1933 and express your concern over this matter.

Kind regards,
Raheem Kassam, Director"

P.S.  You can read more in The Jerusalem Post - HERE.

SOAS and the Middle East

Following my Freedom of Information request, today I had a Commons Motion published about the alleged links between the London School of Oriental and African Studies and the Saudis. The University allegedly has a number of other questionable relations with some individuals of some controversy. I have written to the Vice Chancellor for an explanation.

More details are below from the hard-hitting Student Rights organisation:
***
(You can download the full report HERE)

Student Rights Press Release:

Our latest report uncovers the links with the Saudi Arabian Regime which has resulted in SOAS directly receiving £755,000 from the Saudi Arabian Royal family. Further scandals are also uncovered by this report.
The briefing unveils the fact that SOAS provided Mutassim Gaddafi, the National Security Advisor to the Murderous Gaddafi regime, with private English tutoring and that an agreement between SOAS and Al-Fateh University in Tripoli was signed just months before the uprisings began in Libya.

Perhaps the most shocking revelation is that Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a cleric who is banned from the UK and US for endorsing suicide bombings and the killing of pregnant women, is on the editorial board of the SOAS journal of Quranic Studies. Al-Qaradawi has in addition been condemned by over 2,500 Muslim scholars worldwide.

An article on our report has been written by The Jewish Chronicle and the brief is also the subject of a new Early Day Motion proposed by Robert Halfon MP.
***
This is the response from SOAS:
On the issue of Sheikh Al-Qaradawi's membership of the editorial board of a journal hosted by SOAS, it said:

"Professor Yusuf al-Qaradawi and some other editorial advisers from the Middle East only advise on the Arabic section of the Journal, and not on the English section. His academic peers and Muslim scholars in the UK and across the globe consider him to be one of the most outstanding scholars of the Quran in the Arabic and Islamic world. No political or other consideration was involved in asking him to be on the board."

P.S. You can read and see more at the Harry's Place website HERE.