Saudi sweethearts hoping to give their loved one a beautiful bouquet of red roses for Valentine's Day will have to think outside of the box, due to a government-imposed ban on red roses ahead of the holiday. Saudi Arabia's Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice has ordered florists and gift shop owners in the country's capital of Riyadh to remove any items that are scarlet in color.

Such a clamp-down before Valentine's Day is not uncommon in the religiously conservative country. In the eyes of the Saudi vice squad, Valentine's Day encourages relations between men and women outside of wedlock.

In Saudi Arabia, unrelated men and women are forbidden from mixing, women cannot drive, and women must wear a headscarf and cloak. Relations outside the bounds of marriage are strictly prohibited and punishable by law.