Saudi Religious Police

In deeply conservative Saudi Arabia the religious police once elicited terror, chasing men and women out of malls to pray and berating anyone seen mingling with the opposite sex.

Saudi Arabia has rendered toothless the once-feared religious police amid a liberalisation drive, but a planned "public decency" law is stoking controversy with some fearing a revival of morality policing.

Outside a supermarket in Riyadh, a long-bearded police officer peers at a driver, glances at his female passenger and issues an order: "You should stay away from women."

It's the day before the grand opening of Shaden, a luxury desert camp in Saudi Arabia where air-conditioned tents look out on sandstone cliffs. A princely delegation is on its way. But the place isn't quite ready.

Saudi Arabia has stripped its frequently criticised religious police of their powers to arrest, urging them to act "kindly and gently" in enforcing Islamic rules.

The Saudi religious police issued a rare apology on Tuesday for the beating by its personnel of a British man residing in the kingdom in a supermarket in the capital Riyadh.

Saudi religious police arrested two young men offering a "free hug" to passers-by in the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom's capital, local media reported on Thursday.

A Saudi newspaper says the kingdom's religious police are now allowing women to ride motorbikes and bicycles but only in restricted, recreational areas.

Saudi Arabia will curb the powers of its notorious religious police charged with ensuring compliance with Islamic morality but often accused of abuses, a newspaper report said on Wednesday.

Saudi authorities arrested four members of the notorious religious police who allegedly caused the death of a man and the injury of his wife and two children in a car chase, local media reported on Monday.

A video of a Saudi woman confronting the religious police over breaking modesty rules with her painted nails has gone viral after she posted it on the YouTube, Daily Mail reported on Saturday.

In deeply conservative Saudi Arabia the religious police once elicited terror, chasing men and women out of malls to pray and berating anyone seen mingling with the opposite sex.

Saudi Arabia has rendered toothless the once-feared religious police amid a liberalisation drive, but a planned "public decency" law is stoking controversy with some fearing a revival of morality policing.

Outside a supermarket in Riyadh, a long-bearded police officer peers at a driver, glances at his female passenger and issues an order: "You should stay away from women."

It's the day before the grand opening of Shaden, a luxury desert camp in Saudi Arabia where air-conditioned tents look out on sandstone cliffs. A princely delegation is on its way. But the place isn't quite ready.

Saudi Arabia has stripped its frequently criticised religious police of their powers to arrest, urging them to act "kindly and gently" in enforcing Islamic rules.

The Saudi religious police issued a rare apology on Tuesday for the beating by its personnel of a British man residing in the kingdom in a supermarket in the capital Riyadh.

Saudi religious police arrested two young men offering a "free hug" to passers-by in the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom's capital, local media reported on Thursday.

A Saudi newspaper says the kingdom's religious police are now allowing women to ride motorbikes and bicycles but only in restricted, recreational areas.

Saudi Arabia will curb the powers of its notorious religious police charged with ensuring compliance with Islamic morality but often accused of abuses, a newspaper report said on Wednesday.

Saudi authorities arrested four members of the notorious religious police who allegedly caused the death of a man and the injury of his wife and two children in a car chase, local media reported on Monday.

A video of a Saudi woman confronting the religious police over breaking modesty rules with her painted nails has gone viral after she posted it on the YouTube, Daily Mail reported on Saturday.