DUBAI (AlArabiya.net)
The Saudi vice police stormed a food court at a shopping mall, and told families to leave because there were no partitions to separate families from one another, press reports said on Sunday.
According to the Saudi edition of Al-Hayat newspaper, members of the Commission for the Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice stormed the dining area at the Granada Shopping Center, causing panic among people eating there.
"They made no distinction between men, women, or children. They started pulling chairs out from under everyone," one eyewitness told the paper on condition of anonymity. "I don't know why they acted like that. There was nothing unusual happening in the place."
While some families left hurriedly, others chose to defy the religious police and ate the rest of their food on the floor, Al-Hayat reported.
The mall manager at the time of the incident, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, called what happened "a barbarian assault on the families."
According to the manager, a partition – in the form of screens, curtains or small separate rooms – is used when a woman and her children are dining without a male guardian, but families accompanied by the male head of the family sit at regular tables.
He added that partitions are usually the cause of any problems in restaurants since no one knows what happens behind them: "Open areas are more decent."
The Commission's district representative Mansour al-Otaibi said officers did the right thing.
"Riyadh Province Prince Salman bin Abdul-Aziz instructed the Commission to stop the mixing of the sexes in markets and malls, but people in charge of the mall ignored the instructions and kept procrastinating."
Otaibi said the instructions were clear – each family must be in a partitioned area, and separate families cannot sit together in the open.
(Translated from Arabic by Sonia Farid). |
