SWITZERLAND TO BAN WEARING OF BURQA AND NIQAB

Sun 07 March 2021:

Switzerland voted to ban “full facial coverings” in public places on Sunday. Provisional results showed that the vote in favor of the ban had succeeded with a slim majority.

Just over 51% of Swiss voters cast their ballots in favour of the initiative to ban people from covering their face completely on the street, in shops and restaurants.

Full facial veils will still be allowed to be worn inside places of prayer and for “native customs”, such as carnival.

Face coverings worn for health and safety reasons are also exempt from the ban, meaning face masks worn because of the Covid-19 pandemic will not be affected by the new law.

The Swiss People’s Party — a populist, right-wing party that is the leading faction in parliament — has strongly backed the measure.

One of its campaign posters shows a caricatured image of the scowling eyes of a woman in a niqab above the words: “Stop Islamic Radicalism.”

On Sunday, Justice Minister Karin Keller-Sutter repeated that only a “tiny” fraction (estimated at a few dozen) of the 400,000 Muslims in Switzerland wear such veils. She also welcomed the fact that various Muslim voices had taken part in the campaign.

Muslim groups have criticised the ban. “This is clearly an attack against the Muslim community in Switzerland. What is aimed here is to stigmatise and marginalise Muslims even more,” said Ines Al Shikh, a member of Les Foulards Violets, a Muslim feminist collective.

“This symbolic policy is directed against female and male Muslims,” said the Swiss Federation of Islamic Umbrella Organisations in a statement. “But it also damages the whole of Switzerland, which has undermined its own values by accepting the initiative.”

The initiative behind the referendum was launched in 2016 by the Egerkingen Committee, an association that also successfully pushed for a vote to ban the building of new minarets in 2009, and which has links to the populist rightwing Swiss People’s party.

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