RIYADH: A number of Saudi women drove cars Friday in response to calls for nationwide action to break a traditional ban, unique to the kingdom, according to reports on social networks.
The call to defy the ban that spread through Facebook and Twitter is the largest en masse action since November 1990, when a group of 47 Saudi women were arrested and severely punished after demonstrating in cars.
“We’ve just returned from the supermarket. My wife decided to start the day by driving to the store and back,” said columnist Tawfiq Alsaif on his Twitter page.

“I took King Fahd Road [Riyadh artery] and then Olaya Street, along with my husband, I decided the car for today is mine,” Maha al-Qahtani tweeted.
Her husband Mohammad al-Qahtani tweeted that she carried her necessary belongings “ready to go to prison without fear.”

Another woman posted online a video of her driving after midnight Thursday as the first woman to answer the call for protest. The veiled woman drove along nearly empty main roads until she parked at a supermarket.
“All that we need is to run our errands without depending on drivers,” said the unnamed woman in the video.
Police patrols were out at normal levels on the streets of Riyadh on the first day of the weekend, an AFP photographer reported.

Many Saudi women had pledged on Facebook and Twitter to answer the call to defy the ban.
But instead of staging demonstrations, which are strictly banned in the absolute monarchy, women with driving licenses obtained abroad were encouraged to take individual action.
The response however appeared to be shy.
Women’s rights activist Wajiha al-Huwaidar told AFP Friday that she did not expect a huge turnout as hoped for by sympathizers abroad because of the severe response by officials to women who have taken the lead in recent weeks.

“I don’texpect something big as people abroad imagine,” she said, adding that jailing activist Manal al-Sherif and others has scared some women off.
Sharif, a 32-year-old computer scientist, found herself behind bars for two weeks last month after driving in the Eastern Province and posting footage of her actions on the Internet.

Six other women were also detained after being caught learning to drive on an empty plot of land in Riyadh.
The Facebook campaign, dubbed Women2Drive, says the action will start Friday and run “until a royal decree allowing women to drive is issued.”

There is no law banning women from driving in the kingdom, but the interior ministry imposes regulations based on a fatwa, or religious edict, stipulating women should not be permitted to drive.
A counter Facebook group was created urging men to beat every woman they spot behind the wheel.