RIYADH: Saudi women will be trained to work as air traffic controllers, the Saudi Air Navigation Services (SANS) has announced.
SANS said it was offering theoretical and practical training to 80 women per year to prepare them for work in the air traffic control sector.
“The applicants began taking admission exams on Sunday for the Saudi Academy of Civil Aviation and will undergo a number of editorial tests,” the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said in a report.
Applicants must have a high school diploma with high marks and be between 18 and 25, it said.
Saudi Arabia seeks to create more jobs for women as part of a reform push to wean the economy off oil.
Its Vision 2030 plan aims to increase employment and diversify revenue sources.
Some of the planned changes, like increasing the number of women in the overall workforce to 28 percent from 23 percent and quadrupling their presence in senior civil service roles to 5 percent, would transform society.
Most employed women work for the Kingdom’s vast public sector, primarily in health and education, but authorities say they seek to encourage more hiring by private firms as part of the Vision 2030 plan.
Last year, a senior scholar said women should be allowed to work as paramedics and opticians, and last month women staffed an emergency call center at the Hajj pilgrimage for the first time.
Saudi Arabia trains first women air traffic controllers
Saudi Arabia trains first women air traffic controllers
Over 4.8m captagon pills found hidden in Jeddah charcoal shipment
- Captagon is an addictive, amphetamine-type stimulant that is mass-produced in illicit factories
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Zakat, Tax and Customs Authority foiled an attempt to smuggle more than 4.8 million captagon pills through Jeddah’s port, hidden inside a shipment of charcoal.
The authority’s spokesperson Hamoud Al-Harbi said that a shipment arrived at the port, which, after being assessed by customs authorities, was found to contain a large amount of the illicit drug, hidden inside charcoal bags, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
After the pills were seized, the authority coordinated with the General Directorate of Narcotics Control to ensure that the intended recipients were arrested.
Al-Harbi added that ZATCA is working to tighten customs control on Saudi imports and exports and stands ready to combat smuggling.
He called on members of the public to contribute to the fight against smuggling.
ZATCA may be contacted for security reports by phone from inside the Kingdom at 1910, outside the Kingdom at +9661910, or by email at [email protected].
The authority receives reports related to smuggling crimes and violations of the customs system in complete confidentiality and offers financial rewards to any reports that are accurate.
Captagon is an addictive, amphetamine-type stimulant that is mass-produced in illicit factories.
It is simple to produce compared to other narcotics, and drug smugglers have found a market for the substance in the Gulf states.
Syria under Bashar Assad was one of the largest producers of captagon in the region.
When his government was overthrown in December 2024, one of the first steps taken by the new President Ahmed Al-Sharaa was to crack down on the production of captagon in Syria.
