Legal restrictions on premarital sex

Egypt does not have a specific law against premarital sex, but it does have a legal provision against “committing immoral acts with a woman, even if not in public”, which can, in theory, be thrown at couples in consensual relations before marriage. Elsewhere in the region, laws are little more closely defined. In Oman, for example, the penal code punishes any man and woman having sex without a valid marriage contract with up to one-year imprisonment. For more on laws regulating premarital sexuality in the Arab region, see “Sexual Health and Human Rights: Middle East and North Africa” by Magda Boutros and Hossam Bahgat.