French President Sarkozy speaks out against burka

Susan Sachs

Paris — From Tuesday's Globe and Mail, Monday, Jun. 22, 2009 09:40PM EDT

Five years after outlawing Muslim head scarves in public schools, French lawmakers are taking aim at the face-covering niqab and burka, calling the garments an “ambulatory prison” for women.

On Monday, President Nicolas Sarkozy added his support to a resolution in the National Assembly that would open an inquiry into whether the state should prohibit women from wearing the garments outside their homes.

During a speech before both houses of parliament that was otherwise devoted to the economy, Mr. Sarkozy attacked the niqab as “a sign of subjugation, of degradation of women” that is not welcome in France.

He stopped short of endorsing an outright ban, as called for by one of the most prominent Muslim women in his cabinet.

But he said the issue should be debated openly, and made his own views clear. “We cannot accept in our country that women are prisoners behind a screen, cut off from all social contact, deprived of all identity,” he said.

In the French secular tradition, public spaces – whether schools, government buildings or even the street – are supposed to be neutral zones where differences of religion and identity are not displayed.

Last year, for example, the country's highest administrative court refused to grant citizenship to a niqab-wearing Moroccan woman married to a Frenchman. The court said that wearing the garment, which often leaves only a slit for her eyes, demonstrated that the woman rejected French values.

While the burka debate is at an early stage, prominent Muslim leaders warned that any attempt to regulate how Muslims, or anyone else in France, can dress, could backfire and feed resentment among Muslims who already feel alienated.

The French Muslim Council said that even convening a special inquiry commission would “once again seriously stigmatize Islam and French Muslims.”

Dalil Boubakeur, the moderate head of the main Paris mosque, described the burka as a radical import that is alien to the tradition of Islam. But a debate over whether to outlaw it, he said, may inevitably create tensions by suggesting that Muslims have not or cannot integrate into French society.

The niqab is commonly worn by women in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, and more recently has been adopted by the fundamentalist Salafist movement in North Africa. In France, the word is often used interchangeably with burka, the tent-like garment with a mesh face cover that many Afghan women wear.

No particular incident involving French Muslims set off the demand for a study of the pros and cons of a ban on either garment. But one spark may have been a comment made by Mr. Sarkozy two weeks ago, during the D-Day commemorations in Normandy.

He said then that he agreed with U.S. President Barack Obama that the wearing of the Muslim head scarf poses no problem for Western societies if it represents a woman's free choice.

Critics said Mr. Sarkozy's remarks were a contradiction of French law, which prohibits the wearing of obvious religious symbols like the head scarf in public schools and by government employees who deal directly with the public.

A week later, a Communist deputy representing a suburban Lyon district introduced a resolution in the National Assembly calling the burka and other face-obscuring garments like the niqab a “degrading garment” that effectively negates a woman's citizenship.

More than 80 deputies have since signed on to the resolution to set up a parliamentary commission.

France has one of the largest Muslim populations in Europe, estimated at around 5 million people, mainly of North African origin. While women in head scarves are a common sight, the more extreme body-enveloping clothing is relatively new and much less widespread.

Its appearance has already caused alarm, however.

Unlike in Britain and Germany, where similar proposals have provoked fierce debate over freedom of religious choice, the French prohibition on head scarves in school has functioned with little controversy since its enactment in 2004.

Women's groups, led by Muslim activists, lobbied for the law as a way to protect girls who might be forced, by family or peer pressure, to wear the head scarf. The debate over the burka and niqab has taken similar shape.

“Overall, the women who wear the burka, who have their very existence confiscated, are victims,” said Fadela Amara, the Secretary of State for Urban Affairs and an outspoken advocate of a ban.

The appearance of women covered in all-enveloping robes and with scarves covering all but their eyes, she has said, is a sign of “the concrete presence of fundamentalism on our soil.”

Ms. Amara, the daughter of Algerian immigrants, led the campaign to ban the wearing of the head scarf in schools when she was the head of a women's group, Ni Putes Ni Soumises, which works with Muslim women in the tough French housing projects.

Sihem Habchi, the woman who took Ms. Amara's place as president of the group, said France has since “let down its guard out of fear” and is allowing Muslim fundamentalism to threaten its secular ideals.

A parliamentary commission, she added, should broaden its investigation beyond the burka and look at the decisions made by some French cities, responding to pressure from Muslim groups, to provide separate facilities for men and women at public swimming pools and gyms.

But other commentators have been hesitant about legislating the type of clothing that can be worn in public. “It's an aggression against the dignity of women – symbolic, but an aggression nevertheless,” said Laurent Joffrin, editor of the leftwing newspaper, Libération. “But is this the way to deal with it?”

Special to The Globe and Mail

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Any thoughts on this?

UN rights chief slams Israel over Gaza violations

http://www.reuters.com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSLE479669

I think the cry 'discrimination' is unfortunately a knee jerk reaction by certain members of society who don't expect immigrants to adapt and integrate.

The French woman told not to wear the burkini swimming costume is a French-born woman NOT an immigrant.

Question – why do immigrants need to adapt?

Question – what exactly should they do to integrate?

They are immigrant mannerisms, just because on paper, she's second generation, doesn't make it any less hazardous to integration in society.

Question – why do immigrants need to adapt?

Because that is a consquence of moving to another country, to adapt in a certain way. If not, we end up with trouble such as ethnic strife, rioting and exclusion.

This effort has to come from both ends, from the host country and from the immigrants themselves.

 Question – what exactly should they do to integrate?

Maybe not cut themselves off from society by wearing a black sheet covering their entire body?

Fabs, the lady is a convert to Islam, she is not an immigrant, or descendant of one. Unlike Sarkozy!!!

the woman who wears bikini and seems comletely nacked that represents the showing off and slavery of the body  -  without conscience when the power of animal desrires overcome the mental one  -  is civilized and free.

But the women, who refuse by her willing to be considered as a commercial product, and wear respectful clothes which oblige men to look to her as a human and not a piece of animal desires satisfaction.. is premitive and not free.

Mr Sarkozi tries to appoint himself as incient egyptian gods who has only the right to determine freedom. While he is not able to free his mind from the colonial ideologies basid on racism. He couldn't free himself from the absurdity of french phylosophy. He couldn't understand that faith in God, neither him nor someone else from his international corrupt gang can stop it.

He couldn't fulfil his promises to the french nation he used to preach in the elections, and now trying to turn the focus on his failures to the dress of a category of Muslim women.

 And, for those who speak about Islamic countries, there isn't Islamic country but there is Islamic faith in the hearts of people from al around the world. Christians and Jews in every part of the world as well.  All the divine religions commend chastity, that's why you see Nuns in the Church covering their heads and Jews as well. But for a Muslim women who is sincere, it is proud for her to respect God not only in the Mosque but in every place, because God in not only in the Church or Mosque, But God is the Creator of the earth. And, He made a diversity in the world in colours in nature and in people who are a part of His creatures.

And, now Mr Sarkozi, wanna make one colour. if he wanna change, he should first change the colour of his banner if he can.

Talking about silly ones gives the feeling of being silly too really.

.WHAT IS THE PROBLEM IF WOMAN WANT CHASTITY AND DON'T WANT TO SHOW HER FACE FOR STRANGER MEN????

this program said , France don't like Muslims so much , this is because in the past , it was happen war between France and Russia , at this moment Muslims in Russia at this time was fight with Russia against France…..................... and finally Russia won in this war . this is the which make France don't like Muslims.
What a bullshit!

What a bullshit!

And what a useful contribution from Dissipator as always, yes I can be sarcastic too you piece of bull!

Maybe there is truth in the programme Talknow watched, or maybe it is only part of the story. But your insults always show us how stupid you are.

And what a useful contribution from Dissipator as always, yes I can be sarcastic too you piece of bull!

if it's not a menopause, I'm sure mood changes and irritations will disappear in a week.

Maybe there is truth in the programme Talknow watched, or maybe it is only part of the story. But your insults always show us how stupid you are.

In order to sound as clever as you and Talknow, I feel a need to say that France, remembering its defeat in Russian-French war, hate all one-eyed males, especially Russians. They remind the Frenchmen about Kutuzov…
Please, feel free to share other facts from gutter press. It helps so much to cover blank spots in our knowledges…

 Back to you fabs1… no… u r fabs -1…heheheh

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Fabs1 … is still doing the same…. hahahaha…

want you all to fight …heheheh… he did the same by the way before…...sorry my dearest FABS…i will call you fabs the GAGS…..hahahaha… yoooooh GAGS… yooooh GGGGAAAAAGGGGSSSS

heheheheheh