Dubai: A taxi driver has been accused of groping a woman soldier, who works in the US Army’s special operations, and making her touch him while driving her and her co-workers to Jebel Ali.

The American soldier and her four fellow counterparts were said to have finished spending a day at Mall of the Emirates before they took a taxi to go to Jebel Ali Port in March.

Once the taxi started moving, the 34-year-old Egyptian driver started chatting with the soldier woman who, according to records, was sitting the front passenger seat.

The driver first placed his hand on the American woman’s thigh before she pushed it away. The driver repeatedly put his hand on the soldier’s thigh and caressed it while she persistently moved his hand away until he stopped in a petrol station.

The American moved to the rear seat but the driver insisted that she returned to the front seat to help him with the direction to their destination.

The man repeated what he had done, made her touch him and slid his hand into her shirt before she pushed it away, said records.

Once they reached the entrance of Jebel Ali Port, the American soldier informed the security guards there about what had happened.

The guards made the driver wait till the police, who were informed of the incident, arrived. Police took the driver into custody.

Prosecutors charged the suspect with groping the American woman and making her touch his private parts.

The suspect pleaded not guilty when he appeared in the Dubai Court of First Instance.

His lawyer asked the presiding judge to hear prosecution witnesses’ statements when the court reconvenes on May 20.

The woman soldier, in her 20s, told prosecutors that the suspect groped her after he insisted on her sitting in the front seat.

“He touched my left thigh several times and I kept on pushing his hand away. My fellow colleagues couldn’t see what had happened because the backrest of the seat was high. My female co-worker was the only one who saw what had happened. When I moved his hand away from my shirt, he grabbed my hand and put it on his private parts … I pulled my hand away quickly,” she testified to prosecutors.

A police corporal, who questioned the suspect, told prosecutors: “The suspect dismissed the soldier’s allegations. He claimed that when he saw two of them kissing in the back seat, he asked them to stop … then they asked him if he was a Muslim and when his response was yes, he said he was cursed. The suspect also said the woman accused him of groping her after they reached the port.”

An American female driver at the US army confirmed the soldier’s statement and told prosecutors: “I saw my co-worker pushing his hand away from her thigh twice and she asked him to stop touching her.”

The trial continues.