Dubai: Dubai Police urged the public to respect the traditions of the fasting month of Ramadan by abstaining from drinking, smoking, and eating in public.
Colonel Mohammad Nasser Al Razooqi, Deputy Director of the Criminal Investigations Department of Police Stations Affairs, said that violating the virtues of the fasting month is offending to Muslims and is a criminal act punishable by the law.
In an earlier Gulf News report, Dubai Police arrested three people last year — two Arabs and a European — for eating and drinking in daylight during Ramadan.
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According to Federal law number 3 for the year 1987 and amended in year 2006 pertaining to crimes against religious sensitivities number 313 states anyone found eating, drinking or smoking in public during daylight hours, when Muslims are fasting, faces a month in jail or a Dh2,000 fine.
Brigadier Khalil Ebrahim Al Mansouri, Director General of the Department of Criminal Investigation, urged members of the public to inform police if they saw anyone breaching the ban, which also extends to motorists.
Dubai Police have jailed 24 people in the past three years for breaching the ban.
The fast lasts from sunrise to sunset during Ramadan.
On the occasion of Ramadan, Dubai Civil Defence issued a press statement advising the public to take extra precautionary measures during the fasting month specifically in ways of storing gas cylinders in villas and flats.
