Google – AFP, 28 January 2013
 |
A Saudi man
and woman walk past a clothes shop at a local mall in Riyadh
on August 18, 2012
(AFP/File, Fayez Nureldine)
|
RIYADH —
Saudi authorities have ordered shops employing both men and women to build
separation walls to enforce the strict segregation laws of the
ultra-conservative kingdom, local press reported Monday.
The order
that was issued by labour minister Adel Faqih also had the stamp of Abdullatif
al-Sheikh, the head of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and
Prevention of Vice, commonly known as Mutawa and religious police, several
dailies reported.
It
stipulated that a separation barrier, not shorter than 1.6 metres (over five
feet), should be erected to divide working men and women.
Authorities
in June 2011 told lingerie shops to replace their salesmen, mostly Asian, with
Saudi saleswomen. This directive was later extended to cosmetic outlets.
Saudi women
have long complained they feel uncomfortable having to buy lingerie from men
and would prefer female sales assistants.
In
December, the head of the religious police strongly criticised the labour
ministry, claiming that saleswomen do not have a proper working environment and
that some have been harassed.
The labour
ministry had said the decision to employ women at lingerie shops should create
some 44,000 jobs for Saudi women, among whom unemployment is more than 30
percent, according to official figures.
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