Press. voanews.com
A
decision by France’s highest administrative court declaring the ban on burkinis
illegal may stop more towns from prohibiting the full-body swimsuits, but does
not end a heated battle between French secularists and the country’s Muslims,
analysts said. The three-judge State Council on Friday ruled the ban by the
town of Villeneuve-Loubet “dealt a serious and clearly illegal blow to
fundamental liberties such as freedom of movement, freedom of conscience, and
personal liberty.”
The ban
imposed by officials in Villeneuve-Loubet alleged that allowing the swimsuit
posed a threat to public order, a claim the court said was not supported by
evidence. About 30 coastal towns have
imposed the ban with the blessing of some high officials in the national
government. Prime Minister Manuel Valls has said the swimsuit represents the
“enslavement of women.”
France’s
Minister of Women’s Affairs Laurence Rossignol has called the burkini
“profoundly archaic.” In a recent interview with the French newspaper Le
Parisien, Rossignol said, “the burkini is not some new line of swimwear. It is
the beach version of the burqa and has the same logic: hide women's bodies in
order to better control them."
Terror
attacks stoke anger, suspicion
A string
of terrorist attacks have raised anger, suspicion and aroused a need by many
French to reaffirm the secular nature of their society. French Muslims complain
they are being made victims of collective punishment for terrorist attacks in
which the majority were not involved. President Francois Hollande said Thursday
that life in France "supposes that everyone adheres to the rules and that
there is neither provocation nor stigmatization.”
A court
earlier upheld a ban on women’s head-to-toe swimsuits in the Riviera resort
city of Nice, which is still mourning the deaths of 86 people after last
month’s incident in which a truck plowed through hundreds of people who had
gathered to watch Bastille Day fireworks. The truck was driven by a Tunisian
immigrant and the Islamic State claimed responsibility. The
burkini issue has triggered debates on beaches across the south of France as
the country’s vacation season winds down.
Reaction
in France
At Nice’s
main train station Friday, a Muslim woman wearing a headscarf, who identified
herself only as Latifa, said she had chosen to avoid the beaches altogether. “Integrating
does not mean giving up my tradition and my faith," she told VOA. "I
would just as well not go to a beach where people stare at me or the police
will interfere with me.”
Reports
this week said police in Nice fined an unidentified Muslim woman who was
wearing a headscarf on the beach. The anger unleashed over burkinis speaks of a
battle between a strong religious tradition that mandates female modesty and a
society that regards the secular state as sacred - one in which women have long
felt free to sunbathe topless in beaches and other public places.
In a move
reaffirming the separation of state and religion, France in 2010 enacted a ban
on Islamic headscarves in some public spaces. In Corsica, where tensions
between members of the island’s Muslim community and native Corsicans have
erupted into several incidents of violence over the past several months, police
remained vigilant on the beaches.
“I am
against burkinis, personally,” said Zerdalia Dahoun, a retired Paris
psychiatrist who was among a group of North African activists meeting in
Corsica’s main city, Ajaccio, this week to express their concern over tensions
on the island. “But I am also against the fact that someone would be prevented
from dressing as they want in a public space,” Dahoun, originally from Algeria,
said.
“Even
though I am personally against the burkini because when one goes to the beach
where people are naked, one does not go dressed in a way that will cause one to
be noticed. Either you dress accordingly, or you don’t go at all. It’s a
provocation to go to a place where people are not dressed and to show up with
your clothes on,” Dahoun added.
Debate is
not over
Friday’s
ruling may give pause to other towns whose leaders are thinking of imposing the
ban, but analysts say public sentiment on the issue will mean the debate is not
over. Polls show more than 60 percent of French citizens surveyed are in favor
of the bans while a large percentage is indifferent.
Those
figures are likely to favor Marine Le Pen’s right-wing, anti-immigration
National Front movement in next year’s national elections. Francis Nadizi, the
head of the National Front in Corsica, said his opposition to the burkini comes
from a desire to see Muslims integrated, not isolated from French society. “It
starts, with the clothing,” he said, but wearing Islamic clothing in public, he
said, is meant to mark a difference between them and the rest of society.”
Zerdalia
Dahoun is not undecided on the issue, but she – like many French – is
conflicted. “I know in the United States the Burka is permitted, that it
doesn’t matter, but here in France it’s not like that. We have another system
of integration. It’s not the same. If you’re in a public space, you dress so
you don’t call attention,” Dahoun said.
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