DOHA: Traffic chiefs from GCC countries have concluded a two-day event to discuss a unified strategy to improve road safety and prevent accidents, with Oman proposing that women with face veils should not be allowed to drive.
Women who cover their faces with only their eyes seen should be prevented from driving since it is difficult to identify them in case of accidents or traffic violation, Oman said, Saudi Arabia’s Al Watan Arabic daily reported in its online edition.
The meeting in Jeddah was to discuss a draft of a set of unified traffic guidelines that, if approved, would be incorporated into traffic laws of member-countries.
GCC interior ministers met in Abu Dhabi in 2011 and decided that the draft be referred to all GCC countries for feedback.
However, the Jeddah meet of traffic chiefs from the member-countries that ended recently, lamented that so far only Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain had given feedback.
As a result, the draft guidelines which contain Oman’s proposal to ban veiled women from driving, couldn’t be approved, alwatanonline.com said.
Plans are also afoot to allow nationals and expats holding the driver’s licence of a GCC country to convert it in another without undergoing a test. Additionally, the draft talks of unifying technical inspection of vehicles for road permits throughout the region.
People would be able to buy cars from one GCC state and bring it to another once the draft is approved and enforced. However, to sell a vehicle in a GCC state where it is not registered, an owner would need approval from the GCC country of origin.
Also, a motorist who has committed a traffic violation in a GCC country should be allowed to pay the fine in another member country, suggests the draft.
The traffic chiefs also discussed plans to unify the car insurance system, Saudi Arabia-based news website Aliqtesadia.com (aleqt.com) said. Qatar was also represented at the Jeddah meet, which among other things, discussed to link the traffic departments of the states electronically.
The proposal was made by the UAE, which suggested that the electronic link would be handy in enabling uniform policies for driving licences, road permits, motor insurance, as also in having a regional database of traffic violations, accidents, injuries and deaths.
The Peninsula
