French mayor bans burkinis

A FRENCH mayor has banned burkinis and the Muslim veil in his town’s new leisure park.

His order came despite similar restrictions on Muslim swimwear being ruled illegal last year by France’s highest court, which stated that mayors overstepped their powers.

But Gerard Tardy, the mayor of Lorette in central France, is undeterred.

The leisure park rules, laid down in a town hall decree, state that ‘monokinis, burkinis, veils that partially or totally conceal the face are banned’.

Aldo Oumouden, of the Grande Mosque in Saint Etienne, accused the mayor of ‘an attack on the individual freedoms’ of Muslims. It remains to be seen how the French authorities will react.