Prominent Saudi cleric says women can unveil, travel alone

A major Saudi cleric has made a fatwa, or religious declaration, saying woman can travel without a male guardian, leave their faces uncovered and eat with men. Sheikh Ahmed Bin Qassim al-Ghamdi, who once headed Mecca's Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice committee, tweeted that “it is permissible for people to look at what is not forbidden in women, like their faces and their arms." Al-Ghamdi supported the statements with sayings from prominent Islamic scholars through history, Al-Arabiya reports. The cleric is famous in the kingdom for his progressive statements on women's rights. He had earlier declared that the mixing of the sexes is “permissible in Islam and is a natural part of life.” From: RT