Regional director for sales and marketing at the German National Tourist Office in Gulf Antje Roeding said the men took offense to the red stripes on the German woman's abaya. They also demanded that she not speak to male visitors, according to a report in Thursday's Al-Riyadh newspaper.
“We will stop our participation in the exhibition because of the strange conduct of some men who entered the exhibition in a frightening manner," the report quoted Roeding as saying.
The representative said the men were the only people at the event who behaved deplorably, and that all of the other Saudi attendees behaved in a "polite and ideal manner."
He added that the woman was pushed to the point of tears by the ill manners of the men who forced her to leave. She was escorted from the building and ordered into a taxi.
The woman, who was not identified by name, said she and other foreign women at the event were careful to respect local traditions by wearing abayas and covering their hair.
“After this incident we plan not to come to Saudi Arabia or participate in any future occasion,” the woman was quoted by the paper as saying.
