Tomorrow will mark what many Saudi women will consider a small milestone in personal shopping. From this week, only female staff will be allowed to sell lingerie, relieving the embarrassment of buying underwear in the highly conservative Muslim nation. This is by order of the king, incidentally. The new law provides a rare opportunity for the employment of women, which was previously outlawed.
Constitutional rights don’t hold much water with the Islamic police in Indonesia’s Aceh province. The province’s religious police force have forcibly separated a lesbian couple and warned the two women they could be beheaded under Islamic law. Homsexuality is legal in the rest of Indonesia.