BREAKING NEWS: Saudi Arabia stops tourist visas indefinitely - No reason cited
From Emirates.com:
Saudi Arabia has stopped granting tourist visas to foreigners indefinitely.
No reason was cited for the move, a news agency reported quoting Saudi officials and tour operators.
Emirates 24/7 on August 31 reported that Saudi Arabia had halted issuing tourist visa till February 2011"It was an unexpected decision for everyone...no official reason has been given and if the move is permanent, it will have great impact on travel companies in Saudi Arabia," said Ahmad Moustafa, deputy chairman of the Consultative Committee for Tour Operators.
In 2006, the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities, or SCTA, granted tourist visas to foreigners for the first time and licensed several tour operators to issue the visas. But SCTA said then that alcohol would remain banned, women must cover from head to toe and only Muslims can visit the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
"There has been no issue or a problem been recorded for the commission to cancel the visas," said Prince Abdullah bin Saud, chairman of the Consultative Committee for Tour Operators.
On the contrary, the Arab world's largest economy saw the number of its tourist visas rise to 20,000 in 2009, from 6,000 in 2008, he told reporters in Jeddah earlier this month.
Several Saudi tour operators said that the SCTA wants to focus just on domestic tourism for the time being.
5 comments:
I suspect that they believe that infidels will soil the holy places of Islam. I also think that intolerance will forbid them from serving a ham and cheese sandwich to a hungry tourist.
Does this mean that Keith Ellison can't visit Saudi now?
Just asking.
Funny AOW!
AOW,
That's a very good question. Ellison is a member of the Ummah, so he would be allowed to go to Hajj, right?
From living here I can tell you its a really mundane reason. The current infrastructure (Electricity/Water/Roads/Food...etc). can only support 70% of the population, in case of the roads, less than 50%.
There is just no room for visitors to come in.
This holiday season, this what happened; - well at least in the easter province, which lies on the gulf:
we had 1 million visitors this summer
1. There was no freaking food in the supermarket, search Twitter for panicked tweets.
2. there was so much demand on drinking water that the factories started relaxing their quality assurance, the department of health shut four of them down...we have only five.
3. forget about using your car...get a pony or something...
4. There is no city waste grid, most public spaces have septic tanks tanks...YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED IN THAT ASPECT.
5. We have beaches, which are quite nice actually, however, since most people have their own pools, there are very few swimmers...so...there are very few lifeguards. Not the case this summer, we had 20 times the number of deaths as we had in the last 5 decades.
6. ATM machines ran out of cash
7. Municipality could not keep up with trash
8. Hospitals could not keep up
9. police could not keep up.
10. airport could not keep up.
The summer season has been over for two weeks, I still can't get the following:
bread, lemon, parsley, pepsi, colored washing detergent, cat food, tomatoes, carrots, onions, cereal, car engine oil, tea, BABY FORMULA, and much much more....oh and this is a weird one: there is no more white Hanes white under shirts anywhere...
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