沙特阿拉伯一直嚴禁使用帶有冒犯意思的車牌字母組合，“SEX“、 “ASS”，以及與其宗教教義嚴重背離的酒類消費場所“BAR“均在禁用之列，而“USA”這個字母組合竟然位居禁用列表首位。沙特推出這一政策是因為有些車主在選擇個性化車牌時，特意選擇像“BAD“、“NUT”等有冒犯意思的字母組合。據稱，負責個性化車牌管理的有關部門已經公布了九個禁用的字母組合，要求所有分支機構不再派發包含這些組合的車牌，之前已經派發的則要求更換。

Saudi Arabia has banned auto licence tags whose Arabic characters spell out offensive words when romanised, with the list of banned combinations including "USA".

Saudi Arabia has banned auto licence tags whose Arabic characters spell out offensive words when romanised, with the list of banned combinations including "USA", Al-Watan newspaper reported Sunday.

Saudi plates normally have three Arabic characters and three numbers, but the growing fashion is for auto owners also to display a version using the Latin alphabet and some buyers of personalised "vanity plates" deliberately choose Arabic letters which turn into words like "SEX", "ASS" and "NUT".

The authorities in charge of issuing vanity plates have released a list of nine prohibited three-letter combinations, and ordered all branches to stop renewing plates that include them, according to Watan.

On the list are combinations like "BUT," "BAD" and "BAR" -- the latter presumably a problem because it suggests alcohol, which is strictly prohibited in the conservative Islamic kingdom.

But first on the list, for unexplained reasons, is the combination "USA".

Some 90,000 plates with the prohibited letter combinations are being replaced, Watan said.

Vanity plates are fashionable with wealthy and young Saudis, and auctions of special combinations have brought in as much a six million riyals (1.6 million dollars) for one plate, the newspaper reported.

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(Agencies)

Vocabulary:

vanity plates: 個性化車牌

（英語點津 Helen 編輯）