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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Saudi Arabia will lift its ban on women drivers [wikipedia.org] in June 2018, in a move the interior minister said would "transform traffice safety" [reuters.com]:

Saudi Arabia's lifting of a much criticized ban on women drivers will reduce the number of car crashes in a country with one of the world's worst traffic-related death rates, its interior minister said on Thursday.

King Salman announced the historic change on Tuesday, ending a conservative tradition which limited women's mobility and was seen by rights activists as an emblem of their suppression in the kingdom where Islam originated.

Saudi Arabia was the only remaining country in the world to bar women from driving, a policy that will officially end in June 2018 after a ministerial committee reports on measures needed for implementation.

Prince Abdulaziz bin Saud bin Nayef, the interior minister who took over from his uncle in June, said security forces were ready to apply traffic laws to men and women, though he did not mention if women would be recruited as traffic police.

"Women driving cars will transform traffic safety into a pedagogical practice which will reduce human and economic losses caused by accidents," he was quoted as saying on the ministry's official Twitter feed. He did not elaborate.

The current King of Saudi Arabia [wikipedia.org] was crowned on January 23, 2015.

Also at the Washington Post [washingtonpost.com]. NYT has teaching activities [nytimes.com] for your students.

Related: Saudi Arabia, UAE to Donate to Women Entrepreneurs Fund [soylentnews.org]
Saudi Arabia to Lift Ban on Online VoIP and Video Calling Services [soylentnews.org]

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