UN Authority Figures

UN Commission on the Status of Women: Saudi Arabia

Saudi religious police detained a young woman for violating modesty rules by removing her abaya.
Source: Reuters, December 12, 2016

Mission of the Commission on the Status of Women: "The Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) is the principal global intergovernmental body exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women... The CSW is instrumental in promoting women's rights, documenting the reality of women's lives throughout the world, and shaping global standards on gender equality and the empowerment of women." (Commission on the Status of Women website, "Overview")

Term of office: 2018-2022

Saudi Arabia's Record on Women's rights:
"The most important human rights problems reported included ... pervasive gender discrimination and lack of equal rights that affected most aspects of women's lives... Violence against women;... and discrimination based on gender...were common... The government prohibited women from driving motor vehicles by refusing to issue licenses to them... Gender discrimination excluded women from many aspects of public life...The law does not recognize spousal rape as a crime. The government enforced the law based on its interpretation of sharia, and courts often punished victims as well as perpetrators for illegal "mixing of genders," even when there was no conviction for rape. Victims also had to prove that the rape was committed, and women's testimony in court is, in certain cases, worth half the weight of that of a man. Due to these legal and social penalties, authorities brought few cases to trial. The government did not maintain public records on prosecutions, convictions, or punishments... rape was a serious problem. Moreover, most rape cases were likely unreported because victims faced societal and familial reprisal, including diminished marriage opportunities, criminal sanction up to imprisonment, or accusations of adultery or sexual relations outside of marriage, which are punishable under sharia... There were reports of police or judges returning women directly to their abusers, most of whom were the women's legal guardians...Women continued to face significant discrimination under law and custom, and many remained uninformed about their rights...The law does not provide for the same legal status and rights for women as for men, and ... judges made decisions regarding family matters based on their interpretations of Islamic law... [W]omen have fewer political or social rights than men, and society treated them as unequal members in the political and social spheres. The guardianship system requires that every woman have a close male relative as her "guardian" with the legal authority to approve her travel outside of the country...Nationality law discriminates against women, who cannot directly transmit citizenship to their children... The country's interpretation of sharia prohibits women from marrying non-Muslims... Widespread societal exclusion enforced by, but not limited to, state institutions restricted women from using many public facilities. The law requires women usually to sit in separate, specially designated family sections... Women risk arrest for riding in a private vehicle driven by a male who is not an employee ... or a close male relative. Cultural norms enforced by state institutions require women to wear an "abaya" (a loose-fitting, full-length black cloak) in public."
(U.S. State Department's Country Report on Human Rights Practices 2016, Saudi Arabia)