Burkini ban is illegal, rules court in France
FRANCE’S highest appeal court yesterday scrapped the burkini ban saying it was ‘seriously and clearly illegal’.
Three judges at the Council of State in Paris ruled in favour of an appeal by the Human Rights League and Collective Against Islamophobia in France.
The ruling was watched closely in France and around the world after photos of armed police ordering a Muslim woman to remove her shirt on a beach in Nice sparked outrage this week.
On Monday a tribunal in the French Riviera city ruled that a burkini ban in the nearby town of Villeneuve-Loubet was necessary to prevent public disorder. The Council of State’s verdict specifically concerns that ban but will also provide a legal precedent for France.
However, despite ministry of justice sources in Paris saying the ruling would apply immediately across all resorts, some mayors have risked further legal challenges by saying they would not lift the restriction.
Ange-Pierre Vivoni, mayor of the Corsican town of Sisco, claimed burkinis had sparked clashes between Muslim bathers and locals. He said: ‘Here the tension is very strong and I won’t withdraw it [the ban].’
At least 15 cities, resorts and towns have implemented bans on the fullbody swimsuit this summer and many more were considering the move. The policy has sparked fierce debate about France’s secular values, women’s rights and religious freedom.
Former president Nicolas Sarkozy called for a full ban on Thursday as he warned that immigrants, minorities and the Left were threatening to destroy French identity.
In the first big speech of his campaign to win back the office he lost in 2012, Mr Sarkozy stole many ideas of the far-Right National Front, promising to reclaim France ‘for the French’.
‘I refuse to let the burkini impose itself at French beaches and swimming pools,’ he said. He
‘Enslavement of women’
linked the garment to the attack claimed by terror group Islamic State in Nice last month when a jihadist drove a truck through crowds killing 86 people. The attack and others have left France in fear of Islamic extremism.
Some French mayors have said the burkini could undermine public order by making other beach-goers angry or afraid.
But the groups who brought yesterday’s appeal said 30 Muslims were among the dead in Nice and the attack had nothing to do with swimwear.
Instead they said curbs were being used by racists to spread collective guilt among five million-plus French Muslims, many of whom have strong links to former French colonies.
They argued that the ban was being used to discriminate against Muslim women no matter what they were wearing. Patrice Spi- nosi, for the Human Rights League, said mayors in all towns which had imposed restrictions should now be prepared to refund women who had been fined and scrap their criminal records.
In 2010, France became the first European country to ban the Islamic veil in public places, six years after outlawing the headscarf and other conspicuous religious symbols in state schools.
Security analysts have warned that the dispute will help Islamic State in its bid to portray France and other Western countries as being at war with Muslims.
French prime minister Manuel Valls said he was not in favour of nationwide legislation but appeared to support a law in principle by claiming the burkini was ‘based on the enslavement of women’. ÷ Right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders, whose Freedom Party has led opinion polls in the Netherlands for months, has published a manifesto for elections next March calling for a block on all asylum seekers and migrants from Islamic nations, and for the country to leave the EU. He also called for banning the Koran and closing all mosques and Islamic schools.
Amanda Platell – Page 19