Category Archives: Women

Canada: face veils banned for citizenship oaths

Posted on by Bob Pitt

LEBANON MPSThe government is placing a ban on face coverings such as niqabs for people swearing their oath of citizenship, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Monday. The ban takes effect immediately.

As a result, Muslim women will have to remove their niqabs or any other face-covering garments, such as burkas, before they can recite the oath of citizenship to become Canadians. Citizenship judges will be directed to enforce the rules at ceremonies over which they preside.

It’s a “public declaration that you are joining the Canadian family and it must be taken freely and openly,” he said, calling it “frankly, bizarre” that women were allowed to wear face veils while they swear their citizenship oaths.

Continue reading →

Canada: face veils banned for citizenship oaths

Posted on by Bob Pitt

LEBANON MPSThe government is placing a ban on face coverings such as niqabs for people swearing their oath of citizenship, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Monday. The ban takes effect immediately.

As a result, Muslim women will have to remove their niqabs or any other face-covering garments, such as burkas, before they can recite the oath of citizenship to become Canadians. Citizenship judges will be directed to enforce the rules at ceremonies over which they preside.

It’s a “public declaration that you are joining the Canadian family and it must be taken freely and openly,” he said, calling it “frankly, bizarre” that women were allowed to wear face veils while they swear their citizenship oaths.

Continue reading →

Newly elected New Zealand MP calls for ban on veil

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Richard Prosser (2)The New Zeland press has been covering the political philosophy of Richard Prosser, one of the eight New Zealand First candidates elected to parliament in the recent elections.

In addition to bringing back military service and arming taxi drivers (“His views sound like those of a redneck to me”, the director of the Taxi Federation responds) Prosser proposes a ban on the “burqa”.

His message to veiled Muslim women is: “This is my culture and my country, not yours. Get some respect and conform.”

Sweden: first police cadet with a headscarf

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Donna Eljammal

Donna Eljammal (26) is Sweden’s first police cadet with a headscarf. She had wanted to join the police long before she started wearing a hijab.

“Ever since I was little. I want to help others and move instead of just sitting in front of a computer.”

A few years ago it became possible to wear a headscarf or turban as part of the police uniform, after some debate.

Islam in Europe, 5 December 2011

See also The Local, 6 December 2011

And Polis Tidningen, 30 November 2011

The Mail blames ‘honour attacks’ on Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Mail honour attacks photo

The Daily Mail has a report on the police figures for “honour-based” violence released by the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation.

Some way down the article, a Metropolitan Police spokesperson is quoted as saying: “Honour-based violence cuts across all cultures, nationalities and faith groups – it is a worldwide problem.”

Continue reading →

Muslim woman, 52, racially abused by Telford gang

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Muslim woman was spat at and abused by a gang of six teenagers in Telford who pulled off her religious headdress in a racially motivated attack.

The gang, who were all male, surrounded the 52-year-old woman and started aggressively pushing and shoving her as she walked along a footpath by the skate park near William Reynolds Infant School in Woodside on Tuesday. Chris Ammonds, spokesman for Telford police, said the woman was abused between 6pm and 6.20pm.

Continue reading →

Australia: new initiatives to combat anti-Muslim hatred

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Muslims are being urged to report hate crimes under a special disaster plan to deal with the fallout from terrorist attacks. Under the Muslim Emergency Management Plan, backed by the state and federal governments, Victorians will be given advice on how to react to anti-Muslim incidents, even if they are considered minor.

Muslim victims of abuse are encouraged to save evidence, take photos and report any incident to police and their local mosque or Islamic organisation. And in another initiative, Victoria Police is introducing new strategy to deal with violence and threats motivated by prejudice.

It comes amid growing concern over inter-racial tensions in Melbourne’s suburbs and against the backdrop of fears of further terrorist attacks that could strain relations further.

Police are being asked to develop databases on crime motivated by race or religion, so that offenders can be prosecuted. The “prejudice-motivated crime strategy” focuses on crimes linked to race, religion, sex, age, disability or homelessness.

Muslims told the Herald Sun they faced increasing abuse on the streets because of their religion. “A lot of women get yelled at and told ‘Go home’, or ‘There’s no place for you here’, especially women wearing the burqa,” a Muslim source said. “It happens in shopping centres, at the park or just when you are walking along in the street.”

Continue reading →

Bakery that refused headscarf-wearing Muslim woman a job denies discrimination against husband

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Country Style Foods GrimsbyA Grimsby bakery – found to have discriminated against a headscarf-wearing Muslim woman on religious grounds – is asking top judges to block a similar case being brought by her husband.

Country Style Foods Limited was ordered to pay Latvian-born Anastasija Bouzir about £7,000 in compensation following an employment tribunal’s ruling that it failed to offer her a job at its bread factory in Wickham Road, after she wore a Muslim headscarf to her interview.

Continue reading →

Ontario: suspended sentence in niqab assault case

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A woman who pleaded guilty to assault after pulling off a Muslim woman’s face veil at a Mississauga, Ont., shopping mall was given a suspended sentence on Friday.

Rosemarie Creswell pleaded guilty to assault after mall security footage showed her pulling off Inas Kadri’s traditional face veil, known as a niqab, at Sheridan Centre in Mississauga in August 2010. Kadri was with her two small children when the attack occurred.

Continue reading →