Riyadh is boom town as Saudis enjoy oil bonanza

Saudi Arabia has by far the largest Arab economy, dwarfing countries such as Egypt, which has a population of over 70 million compared to Saudi Arabia's 24 million.

The economic turnaround has helped Saudi Arabia reestablish itself after the September 11 attacks on U.S. cities in 2001, when 15 Saudis were among 19 young Arabs who killed 3,000 people, taking U.S.-Saudi relations to a low.

A stream of foreign leaders have visited Riyadh since King Abdullah took the throne in 2005, as Saudi Arabia forges political and economic links with China, India and Russia, expanding on traditional close ties with London and Washington.

PROBLEMS

Wealth is throwing up many problems in a country still dominated by an arcane school of Islam that forbids women from driving and maintains strict gender segregation in public.

Urban dilemmas familiar in countries with long cosmopolitan traditions have become pressing issues in cities like Riyadh.

"You see a large number of fancy cars and boys cruising around in fancy clothes in fancy cars. But it's not always great -- it makes the traffic crazy," said Ahmed al-Omran, a well-known Internet blogger.

Saudi commentators lament about drugs, teenage joyriding and cultural influences on the growing numbers of young people who have jumped on board the information technology revolution.

The shopping malls show striking contrasts in fashion, from women covered in black from head to toe, with not even their eyes showing, to teenagers with short rough-cut jeans, designer sunglasses and fashionably unfashionable Afro hairdos.

One of the country's most insistent problems is its continued addiction to foreign labor, still hosting 7 million foreigners despite rising unemployment.