ADVANCING WOMEN'S RIGHTS IN A FUNDAMENTALIST

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 RIYADH 000899

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR NEA/ARP, NEA/PPD (PAGNEW, DBENZE),NEA/ARP
(HARRIS),ECA/A/E/NEA (DIVES),ECA/A/S/A (CDANZ)

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/06/2019
TAGS: KPAO PGOV PINR OEXC SCUL KWMN SA
SUBJECT: ADVANCING WOMEN'S RIGHTS IN A FUNDAMENTALIST
COMMUNITY: PRINCESS NOURA AND THE LADIES OF QASSIM

REF: A) RIYADH 875 B) RIYADH 860 C) JEDDAH 78

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Classified By: CDA Ambassador Richard Erdman, 1.4 (b),(d)


1. (C) SUMMARY: Advocating women,s rights in Saudi Arabia is
a difficult task under the best of circumstances. In Qassim
Province north of Riyadh, deep in the Kingdom,s conservative
Nejd heartland, it can be life-threatening. Despite the many
obstacles, a courageous and assertive Princess, Noura bint
Mohammed, has taken a moribund state-organized women,s NGO
and turned it into a dynamic and broad-based network of
committees providing social and economic support to women
coping with poverty, isolation, and cultural strictures. In
this fundamentalist Wahhabi community, her work provides an
important counterpoint to the appeal of extremist ideology
and the impact of the Saudi government,s struggle against
domestic terrorism. Post has cooperated discreetly with
Princess Noura for four years, and recently visited Qassim to
assess the status of her efforts. The work of the Qassim
women is consistent with that of other Saudi women activists
who aim to build a more cohesive Saudi women,s movement
focused on pragmatic steps to improve women,s rights (Ref
A). (End summary.)


AN ACTIVIST PRINCESS BUILDS
A NETWORK OF SUPPORT FOR WOMEN
--------------


2. (C) Princess Noura bint Mohammed, wife of the Governor of
Qassim, has single handedly nurtured her organization, the
Women,s Committees of Qassim, into a grassroots
counterweight to the impact of terrorism and the appeal of
extreme fundamentalism in the heart of the Nejd, the most
conservative region of Saudi Arabia. In the nine years since
she joined husband Prince Faisal bin Bandar bin Abdulaziz in
the Governor,s palace in Qassim, Noura bint Mohammed has,
largely through the force of her personality, taken a
relatively moribund state-organized NGO, the King Abdulaziz
Philanthropic Association (KAPA) for Women, and re-energized
it by using it as the framework for a number of activist
cells,: the Women,s Committee of Qassim and its growing
constituent committees, including a Patients, Committee, a
Breast Cancer Awareness Committee, a Diabetes Awareness
Committee, an Environment Awareness Committee, and a Friends
of Martyrdom Committee. These Committees have empowered the
women of Qassim to take socially and politically daring steps
to deal with poverty and fundamentalist suspicion, as well as
women,s health issues, children,s education programs, and
micro-finance projects.


AN UNFORSEEN BUT VITAL ROLE
IN HELPING PREVENT RADICALIZATION
--------------



3. (SBU) Her program took on an urgent political role, for
which it was uniquely suited, in 2004/2005 when the Saudi
state, reeling from terrorist attacks in Riyadh, discovered
that a large number of the soldiers and policemen killed in
battles with extremists hailed from Qassim. The Royal family
recognized the immediate need -- and the PR value -- for
aiding the stricken families of these soldiers, who were
potentially vulnerable to radicalization themselves if they
weren,t properly cared for. The Princess,s organization
stepped in, assigning individual women to mentor the family
of each &martyr8 who had died protecting the Kingdom from
terrorism.



4. (SBU) The Women,s Committee representatives oversaw the
education of these families, children, visited their homes
to ensure they were receiving proper social and health care,
and intervened with authorities if they were not. The
Committee could step into this quickly and effectively
because it had succeeded in establishing a structure of
collaboration with government ministries in Qassim. The
Committee continues to stage several events a year to bring
the families together to meet with the King and other
dignitaries who provide the children with gifts. The impact
of these events is revealed in KAPA,s NGO presentation
(shared with Post),which shows a picture of King Abdullah so
moved during a reception for the families of the martyred men
that he is weeping in the presence of their children.



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IDENTIFYING AND MOTIVATING LEADERS AND MANAGERS
-------------- --



5. (SBU) The Princess,s success rests in large part on her
ability to identify and motivate community leaders and
managers for her programs. Like a European princess of old,
she has surrounded herself with the provincial female elite:
the few Ph.D.s and Masters Degree holders; the wives of
academics, bankers, and businessmen; the small, but vital
number of professional women from the Ministries, the local
hospitals, and the universities; the English speakers; and
those who have traveled beyond the conservative confines of
the region. These women form her volunteer base, and several
times a month she hosts groups of them at her home. She
charges them up with pep-talk style descriptions of their
successes and encouraging words describing what they have
done and how important they are to the people of Qassim.
Many of the professional women wear two hats, one for their
government and professional work, and another for their
avocation in the Qassim Women,s Committees.



6. (SBU) Another key to the Princess,s success has been her
ability to identify competent managers for her programs. She
recruited a talented Jordanian project manager to advise and
oversee KAPA,s Saudi directors, keeping the organization,s
daily operations flowing for the last four years, while the
Princess herself focused on fundraising.


NO WORK FOR THE TIMID
--------------



7. (C) Volunteering for one of the Qassim women,s committees
involves considerably more than tea parties. In the
hyper-conservative cultural climate of Qassim, physical
courage is often necessary as well. Several activists
described the tough physical and social conditions they face
in carrying out their work in remote villages and towns.
They noted they always have the Princess,s personal cell
phone number at hand in case they run into problems with
overzealous authorities, the ubiquitous Muttawwa "religious
police," or suspicious husbands or male relatives. Problems
can occur even though KAPA works closely with the Ministry of
Interior and other ministries to vet the families it is
working with.



8. (C) The Mother/Child Home-based Education Program carries
many potential risks for committee members, who carefully
stage appointments, usually when the male head of the family
is out. The program meets with mothers to teach the
importance of early childhood education, especially in
families too poor to send their children to kindergarten.
The project provides material needs such as books or clothes,
and helps mothers learn how to care for their children at
home. Volunteers also use the opportunity to educate the
women discretely about their rights.


BUILDING MICRO LOANS INTO MAJOR INVESTMENTS
--------------



9. (SBU) In addition to social protection, KAPA tries to help
very poor Qassim women advance economically. A Revolving
Loans Project, a variation on traditional micro-finance,
gives many home-bound women opportunities to increase their
income and support their families through starting micro and
small business. The maximum loan of SR3000-60.000 (USD
800-16,000) has helped women start up enterprises ranging
from tailoring shops, retailing, poultry production and food
processing, to traditional handicrafts production and even
sheep breeding. According to KAPA, recapitalization isn,t a
major problem with a 93% repayment rate.



10. (SBU) At the other end of the economic spectrum, one
associate of the Princess described a fairly well-developed
commercial banking system for well-established Qassim women,
such as those who volunteer for KAPA. She asserted that
these women are no longer simply saving, but are actually
investing rather aggressively. Indian and Chinese financial
instruments were extremely popular, she said. She wouldn,t
reveal the value of these investments, but noted it was well

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over SR500 million (USD 133 million).


EXPANDING TO SUPPORT CONTINUED GROWTH
--------------



11. (SBU) Princess Noura has recently spent much of her own
time (as well as her own money according to rumors)
coordinating a multi-million dollar expansion of the KAPA
facilities. This well-executed expansion, financed with a
mix of public and private funds, includes a doubling of
training space to incorporate high tech classrooms, a huge
state-of-the-art theater, and conference rooms with separate
seating areas so men and women can attend events
simultaneously. The Women,s Committees of Qassim will host
a November 2009 grand opening for what will be one of the
largest, most impressive and versatile NGO training
facilities for women in the Kingdom.


COMMENT
--------------



12. (C) Princess Noura has built a strong women,s NGO in the
conservative Nejd heartland combining resources from the
central government, Royal connections, including her own, and
creative use of programs from donors. However, she would
probably be the last person to seek international publicity
for herself and her work. Despite her royal status, too much
international or even domestic recognition could subject her
to fundamentalist criticism, suspicion, and possibly the risk
of physical harm.



13. (SBU) Embassy Riyadh has discretely worked with KAPA for
four years now, identifying and sending four KAPA activists
on regional IVs, overseeing a large MEPI-funded Breast Cancer
Awareness project and sponsoring various workshops including
English language specialists. Ten young women identified
from KAPA,s Empowering Young Girls project are presently
studying English at a Saudi academy under an Embassy grant.
The English study and computer skills acquired at KAPA,s
facility will give them additional tools to use in the
workplace to perhaps join the cadre of women willing to take
on the many social issues that continue to face women in this
important Saudi region.



14. (C) Princess Noura,s Committees and volunteers are doing
exactly the kind of pragmatic, grassroots work that is the
chief goal of other activists trying to forge a larger
movement focused on achieving practical improvements in the
lives of Saudi women. It is unlikely there are links between
the Qassim committees and the &Stolen Rights8 movement
described in ref. A, because of the risk such links would
create for the Qassim women, but there would appear to be a
natural affinity between these two groups, as well as with
women's organizations in Jeddah that have been pushing to
remove barriers to women's full participation in the economy
(Ref. C).
ERDMAN