JEDDAH, 24 December 2006 — Nearly one in four marriages in the Kingdom ends in divorce, according to a Justice Ministry report published yesterday.

For 105,066 marriage contracts registered last year, 24,000 divorce cases were recorded by the ministry, Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper said, quoting the ministry report.

The statistics come amid intense debate over the surge in divorce rates in the country.

The High Court in Jeddah said earlier this year that divorce rates in the city had risen by 60 percent over the last two years against 39 percent in the capital Riyadh and 18 percent in the Eastern Province.

A medical expert recently attributed the soaring divorce rate in the Kingdom to high incidence of diabetes among the Saudi population.

“One of the negative effects of diabetes is that it increases the number of divorce cases in the Kingdom as it affects sexual relations among couples,” said Dr. Abdul Aziz Al-Tuwaim, head of the department of pediatric endocrinology at King Abdul Aziz Medical City in Jeddah and chairman of the World Diabetes Day Committee.