USA TODAY
Four congresswomen got an up-close look at gender segregation in Saudi Arabia during a trip to the Middle East earlier this month.The congresswomen — Republican Reps. Diane Black of Tennessee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, Kay Granger of Texas and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia — traveled there with five congressmen to talk with government officials about how the region assesses the threat of a nuclear Iran.
When the lawmakers asked to use the bathroom after a lengthy visit to the Saudi Defense Ministry, they ran into an unexpected challenge: no women's restroom.
"It was kind of like, hmm, OK, I've heard about oppression, but really there are just some things that are natural and biological," Black, a former nurse, said with a laugh.
The male lawmakers on the trip, who learned about the problem only after they had used the facilities, offered to stand outside the men's restroom while the women used it. But the Saudis seemed to frown on that option, so the women had to "wait and endure it," said Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont, the lone Democrat on the trip.
Welch and Black said Saudi officials didn't seem bothered by the lawmakers' predicament.
"'Why would you need it?' That was sort of their attitude," Welch said. "No Saudi women work there but you would think that they were accustomed to having delegations from Western countries that included women."
The experience was "astonishing," Welch said, but the lawmakers didn't complain because they understood they were in another country with different rules.
"These are strong independent women and they're used to being treated equally and treating others equally, and you're in a society where there's strict segregation and it's pretty stunning," he said.
The World Economic Forum 2011 Global Gender Gap Report ranked Saudi Arabia 131th out of 135 countries for gender parity, ahead of only Mali, Pakistan, Chad and Yemen. It was one of four countries, including Belize, Brunei Darussalam and Qatar, to score a zero for political empowerment of women.
Saudi women cannot drive a car or leave home without a male family member's permission, and many struggle to find jobs in sex-segregated workplaces.
Women also must adhere to a strict dress code, although Western officials aren't subject to those rules while traveling in the country. Most Saudi women wear a headscarf, veil and abaya, a floor-length cloak.
Nadya Khalife, a Middle East and North Africa researcher in the women's rights division at Human Rights Watch with offices in Washington and around the world, said she's "not at all surprised" that the Saudi Defense Ministry lacks a women's restroom.
"This just goes to show the extent to which the Saudi government doesn't have women in mind," she wrote in an email. "Not only are women invisible in their architectural plans, but also as full members in society."
An official at the Saudi Arabian embassy in Washington could not be reached for comment on Wednesday.
Saudi Arabia's 87-year-old King Abdullah has promised some reforms, such as allowing women to vote in municipal elections in 2015. The country also has built its first all-women's university, sponsored efforts to reduce domestic abuse and opened some retail jobs to women — such as working in lingerie shops, which had been staffed mostly by men.
Black said the Saudi government is making progress, especially in women's education.
"They are aware that they have to look at women's rights more seriously," she said.
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