Amnesty launches campaign for Saudi women’s right to drive

Faye Mooney
WVoN co-editor

Amnesty International has launched a new campaign in support of the right of women in Saudi Arabia to drive.

The campaign calls on the Saudi authorities to stop arresting women for driving, to halt all prosecutions against women for driving and to quash any sentences in relation to the offence, including floggings.

It aims to support and promote Saudi Women’s Driving Campaign, which has seen Saudi Arabian women bravely defying the law and taking to the wheel in protest.

Amnesty supporters in the UK are targeting Saudi Arabia’s ambassador in London, Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf. They are calling on him to press the Saudi King to ‘heed demands of Saudi women to drive as a first step towards guaranteeing their basic rights and ending the discrimination against them’.

Activists around the world are using a photo-sharing site to spread images and messages of solidarity to Saudi women who have risked a great deal in their attempts to overturn the ban on women driving.

A new video which accompanies the campaign entitled “Saudi Arabian women must drive their way to freedom” shows the punishments faced by women who defy the country’s female driving ban.

Amnesty International UK Director Kate Allen said: “The ban on driving is just one example of pervasive discrimination that women in Saudi Arabia have to face.

“It’s utterly shocking that a woman in Saudi Arabia could be given a sentence of flogging simply for getting behind the wheel of a car. It’s time for this to end and for the Saudi authorities to respond to international outrage on this issue.”