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ASIR – The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Haia) detained an Indian man on Monday for “tempting women” and “arranging forbidden meetings between Indian males and females”. The Haia spokesman in the region said information

had been received concerning the mans activities at housing on the outskirts of Abha and that a

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MADINA – A man here has accused the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Haia) of assaulting him and holding him illegally inside a restaurant on Sultana Street on Saturday because they found his trousers unacceptable.

Muhammad Sultan said he had pulled over at the restaurant to buy breakfast for his wife and her mother, who were in the car, when a Haia member approached him and asked for identification “claiming that I was suspicious”, Sultan said.

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JIZAN – The spokesman for the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Hai’a) in Jizan has denied that a man recently sentenced to lashes for having six wives was a member of the organization.
Spokesman Muhammed Bin Ali Al-Adhabi told Al-Madina Arabic daily that the 56-year-old was not a security guard, as reported, “at any of the Hai’a offices” and that he has “no connection at all to the field or administrative work of the Commission”.
Al-Adhabi told Al-Madina that it was the Hai’a itself that arrested the man in Ahad Al-Masareha after they received information and located him at a furnished flat. During questioning contradictions were revealed in his statements and “deception” uncovered in a family identity card, Al-Adhabi said. He added that the court ruling of 120 lashes of the whip was final and had been approved by the Court of Cassation.
The court ruled that the sentence be carried out in three phases of 40 lashes, with a minimum of 15 days between each. The sentence also includes a five-year ban on travel abroad and also bans the convicted from giving sermons or leading prayer in mosques.
The convicted man claimed he was unaware that marriage to six wives simultaneously was against Shariah Law.
Neighbors of the man, however, say they had heard he had six wives and also believed him to be a member of the Hai’a.
“He used to lead prayer at the mosque in the village where he lived, and would go round in an official Hai’a car telling people to pray,” Khalid Al-Hukami told Al-Madina. “We’d heard about him, but didn’t think he would have had six wives at the same time, as here in the south lots of people have more than one wife and get married and divorced all the time.” – SG

HAFR AL-BATIN – Four youths were detained by police in Hafr Al-Batin on Wednesday for attempting to steal a vehicle belonging to the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Haia).

Routine police patrols spotted three of the youths trying to prise open the door of the car as a fourth kept an eye out from afar.

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RIYADH: The Kingdom’s grand mufti, Shaikh Abdul Aziz Al-Ashaikh, has called on the Ministry of Health (MoH) to monitor clubs and centers which offer massage services.

Al-Ashaikh said that the monitoring should be carried out before the centers turn into a threat to society due to the unpleasant practices that might go on in them. The grand mufti spoke to local newspapers following an incident in Riyadh in which both young Saudi and Asian men were caught behaving immorally and which therefore resulted in the closure of the center in which they were caught. The men were taken into custody by the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice and the center was closed by the Riyadh municipality.

“The practice of sinful acts in these clubs is a danger to our society the concerned authorities must investigate the massage services that these places offer. The centers have to be closely monitored,” he added. The grand mufti also said, “The Ministry of Health must stop these practices before they threaten our society.”

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JEDDAH/RIYADH: Its that time of the year again when the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (Haia) sees red at shopkeepers selling Valentine things or even strawberries on cakes.

Customers ask us for cakes with strawberries on them, which we sell throughout the year, said Samir, a sales clerk at a well-known Riyadh patisserie. Then we are ordered not to sell them (around Valentines Day).

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JEDDAH: The second phase of a yearlong campaign to get rid of men who work as sales clerks in lingerie shops has commenced with activists calling for a two-week boycott of such shops starting on Saturday.

The move comes four years after the Labor Ministry had announced an initiative to employ women in these shops. Since the announcement was made in 2005, nothing has been done, boycott organizers have said. For their part, lingerie shop owners have viewed the ministry’s decision as optional and the ministry has denied the initiative was canceled or postponed.

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TAIF – The head of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Haia) in Makkah has said that an immediate investigation has been set up into the detention of a man in Taif for “having long hair”.

Haia chief Ahmed Al-Ghamdi said the man in his twenties was working at a store in Taif when he was detained by members of the Haia and held for three hours on Wednesday, with an initial report from staff stating that the action was taken because he “had long hair and looked like a girl”.

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JEDDAH: Final exams in Saudi public schools ended recently, much to the relief of students and families. It’s not just the pressure of pass or fail, but also the stress that is brought home, according to Mukhtar Muhammad Maulud, the head of the Reconciliation Department in the Makkah General Court, which is responsible for mediating family disputes. End-of-semester exams and Ramadan are the most testing times for family relations, he said the former due to the pressure on students and their families to ensure good grades, and the latter he attributed to the economic stress of the fasting month on Saudi families who tend to host iftar dinners and end the month by buying gifts for the children, new household items and clothes.

Busted selling ‘witchy’ books

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JEDDAH – A man and wife are in jail at Al-Jami’a Police Station accused of attacking staff from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (the Hai’a) in the Al-Rawabi district of Jeddah.
The couple had reportedly gone to offices of the Hai’a with their son after he had earlier complained of being “maltreated” by Hai’a staff while outside a girls’ school, but the appearance of the three led the Hai’a to call in police and claim that the parents and son had attacked Hai’a staff at the office.
A Hai’a official in Al-Rawabi declined to comment on the issue, but a source at the Commission for Investigation and Prosecution (CIP) said the case would be turned over to them to decide whether the couple should be released or not once details had been established.
A legal advisor to the Human Rights Commission in Makkah said that without the specifics of the case it was difficult to comment, but added that the couple “should not be detained unless they had in fact attacked Hai’a staff”. – Okaz/SG