:: Makkah police on Friday intervened to end an inmate riot that started as a protest against the management of a girls’ protection home in Makkah; nine girls were arrested, according to Arabic daily Okaz.

Under-aged girls being investigated for crimes, and females who are under 30 years of age and ordered to be imprisoned by a judge, are held at the facility.

The arrests were made after the doors and glass of the home’s management office were broken in protest at the alleged poor treatment the inmates receive from the facility’s staff.

The newspaper reported that inmates who were interrogated in the home demanded that the manager and some of her staff be removed because of their “bad treatment” of the residents.

The National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) said the girls were subject to violations, as the NSHR had previously called for certain reforms at the facility but no improvements were seen.

“A team previously visited the home and filed recommendations and reports calling for reforming the home’s educational and administrational conditions to take into consideration the girls’ need for guidance and their psychological conditions at the same time; unfortunately, our reform recommendations were not implemented,” the chairman of the NSHR in Makkah, Sulaiman Al-Zaydi, was quoted by the newspaper as saying.

“This shows the home’s (management) inability to comprehend the girls’ social conditions and circumstances that led them to the home (in the first place),” he added.

Spokesman for the Ministry of Labor and Social Development Khaled Aba Al-Khail said the inmates violated regulations and directives, and were dealt with according to the law.