Category Archives: Hijab

Hijab will not be permitted in Norwegian police force, says minister

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Minister of Culture Hadia Tajik concludes that the hijab will not become part of the Norwegian police uniform or be used in the court system in the near future.

Despite the Norwegian Faith and Ethics Policy Committee’s recommendation to make the hijab legal to wear for police officers and judges while at work, Tajik rejected the committee’s proposal in Parliament Monday.

A majority of 12 out of 15 members of the committee suggested to permit the use of hijab in the Norwegian police force and among judges, but according to Tajik no changes wil be made to the current ban in the near future.

Norway Post, 8 January 2013

See also “Norway minister nixes police hijab”, Press TV, 8 January 2013

Belgian Hema store wrong to sack headscarf-wearing worker

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Belgian branch of Dutch department store Hema was wrong to sack a woman worker for wearing a headscarf, a Belgian industrial tribunal ruled on Wednesday.

The woman had worked for the store in Genk for two months wearing a headscarf but was then sacked for refusing to remove it after complaints from customers.

The tribunal ordered Hema to pay the 21-year-old woman six month’s salary – €9,000 – in compensation.

The company has since drawn up formal clothing requirements for its Belgian stores, news agency ANP said.

Dutch News, 2 January 2013

See also KUNA, 2 January 2013

Woman jailed after pulling hijab from victim in racist attack

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A woman who launched a racist attack against a Muslim and pulled her hijab from her head as she robbed her of her phone has been jailed for more than two years.

Eileen Kennedy, 28, and her 16-year-old niece Paige Bain assaulted Umaimi Musa in Glasgow in September.
 The teenager also assaulted Ms Musa’s friend, Mary Marandran, who was five months pregnant with her third child.

Continue reading →

New York: veiled Muslim woman sues over exclusion from buses

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Muslim woman claims she’s being booted off city buses because of the way she dresses.

Maria Louis, of Hollis, Queens, says she has twice been kicked off buses by MTA and NYPD personnel – the agencies she’s suing in Brookyn federal court – after people berated her for her religious garb. Her clothing, which she calls a “bolka,” is a “long, flowing black garment that covers her completely – including a mesh section over her eyes that allows her to see,” the suit says.

The first incident happened April 3 in Jamaica, when a passenger yelled at her and the driver refused to move until she got off, the suit says. The next month, she claims, a passenger hit her in the face after another lectured her, and police forced her to get off the bus.

New York Post, 27 December 2012

Muslim family taking school to High Court over hijab ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

St Cyprian's schoolA Greek Orthodox school is being taken to the High Court for banning a Muslim pupil from wearing a headscarf.

The nine-year-old girl’s parents were so incensed at the decision they have pulled her out of St Cyprian’s Greek Orthodox Primary Academy, in Thornton Heath. Now they have applied to the High Court in an attempt to force the school – the only one of its kind in the country – to reverse its ban on their daughter wearing a hijab.

Continue reading →

Putin opposes headscarves in Russian schools

Posted on by Bob Pitt

President Vladimir Putin spoke against the wearing of hijabs at Russian schools Thursday saying that the practice runs counter to Russian traditions. “Why should we adopt outside traditions?” Putin said during a marathon question-and-answer session with Russian and foreign reporters on Thursday.

A test case of Russia’s hijab policy emerged in October, when Muslim parents in a village in Russia’s southern Stavropol Region complained to prosecutors over a ban on headscarves at their daughters’ school. The parents said the ban violated their daughters’ constitutional rights to receive an education and practice their religion.

Rossiiskaya Gazeta reported on Tuesday that Stavropol governor Valery Zerenkov signed regulations banning school students from wearing headscarves as well as “immodest” dress such as shorts and low-cut dresses.

Education and Science Minister Dmitry Livanov had previously said wearing headscarves did not violate any law on education.

It was not immediately clear whether the headscarf ban applies to all educational institutions in the district or only state-run schools.

RIA Novosti, 20 December 2012

Muslim family taking school to High Court over hijab ban

Posted on by Bob Pitt

St Cyprian's schoolA Greek Orthodox school is being taken to the High Court for banning a Muslim pupil from wearing a headscarf.

The nine-year-old girl’s parents were so incensed at the decision they have pulled her out of St Cyprian’s Greek Orthodox Primary Academy, in Thornton Heath. Now they have applied to the High Court in an attempt to force the school – the only one of its kind in the country – to reverse its ban on their daughter wearing a hijab.

Continue reading →

Canada’s Supreme Court dismisses appeal by witness denied right to testify wearing niqab, rejects blanket rule on veil in court

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Canadian judges should decide on a case-by-case basis whether women can wear the niqab, a full-face veil, while testifying in court, but a blanket rule on the issue would be “untenable,” Canada’s top court said on Thursday.

The decision, supported by four of the seven judges who heard the case at the Supreme Court of Canada, said lower courts must consider, among other things, the harm that could come if Muslim women who wear the niqab feel discouraged from reporting offenses.

But the ruling also said that where a witness’s credibility is central to the case, “the possibility of wrongful conviction must weigh heavily in the balance.” Judges must also consider the sincerity of a witness’s religious beliefs.

Continue reading →

Belgian Constitutional Court says veil ban does not violate human rights

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Last week the Belgian Constitutional Court rejected a claim to annul the ban on face coverings, better known as “burqa ban”. This ban prohibits the wearing of clothing that covers the face, or a large part of it, in the public space. The Constitutional Court concluded that the ban does not violate fundamental rights such as the right to freedom of religion, the right to freedom of expression and the right to private life, provided that the ban is not interpreted in such a way that it also covers places of worship.

Strasbourg Observers, 14 December 2012