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Riyadh: US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday visited Saudi Arabia's unelected advisory council, the closest thing in the kingdom to a legislature, where she tried out her counterpart's chair - a privilege no Saudi woman can have because women cannot become legislators.
Pelosi, the first US woman house speaker, said she raised the issue of Saudi Arabia's lack of female politicians with Saudi government officials on the last stop of her Mideast tour, but she refrained from criticising the kingdom over it.
"It's a nice view from here," said Pelosi as she sat in the chair, facing the ornate chamber with its deep blue and yellow chairs and gilded ironwork.
"This chair is very comfortable." US Representative Tom Lantos, the head of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who was travelling with Pelosi, looked at the gavel in front of her and quipped: "It's a small gavel, madame speaker. You may want to wield it."
'Very pleased'
Pelosi later sidestepped a question on how she felt about the absence of women Saudi female Shura members, saying: "I am very pleased that after 200 plus years in the US we finally have a speaker.
It took us a long time." Asked if she brought up the issue at yesterday's meeting with the council members, she said: "The issue has been brought up in our discussions with the Saudis on this trip."
The Majlis Al Shura, or Consultative Council, was expanded and given more powers in 1992 as a gesture toward forming a legislature. Its 150 members are chosen by the King and advise him, and the body has the power to propose new laws for the government's approval.
Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz has spoken of reform in his country.
Pelosi arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, meeting with King Abdullah at his farm outside Riyadh.
Lantos told The Associated Press the discussions "went extremely well." He said the two sides discussed at length the Arab peace initiative, which was proposed by Saudi Arabia at a 2002 Arab summit and was relaunched at a summit in Riyadh last week.
Pelosi, wearing a green suit, was welcomed at the Shura council by its head, Shaikh Saleh Bin Hamid, who is also the imam of the Grand Mosque in Makkah.
He placed his right hand on his chest in a traditional Arab greeting, since clerics don't shake hands with women, and she returned the greeting in a similar manner.
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