Ninety lashes for man caught kissing woman in Saudi mall

A SAUDI court convicted a man and sentenced him to four months in prison and 90 lashes for kissing a woman in a mall, a government-owned daily reported.

Saudi religious police arrested the man and two women after seeing them on mall cameras “engaging in immoral movements in front of other shoppers”, the Al-Yom newspaper said.

The man, who is in his 20s, was seen with a woman “sitting on one of the chairs, exchanging kisses and hugs”. It was unclear what the other woman was doing. Neither the man nor the women were identified by name.

The kingdom’s powerful religious police, under the control of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, enforce Saudi Arabia’s strict interpretation of Islam, which prohibits unrelated men and women from mingling.

Zealous officers routinely jail unrelated couples found sitting together in restaurants or coffee shops. Such kissing busts have increased as economic pressures have made it harder for young couples to marry.

Young men often must pay more than $50,000 (€41,200) in dowry and gold before their brides’ families will accept marriage – a huge burden in a country where male unemployment is at 20%.

But the Saudi establishment remains divided on how far separation rules should go.

King Abdullah has been encouraging change in the oil-rich kingdom since becoming crown prince in 1982, and has intensified his efforts since assuming the throne in 2005.