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Paris. – French schools sent dozens of girls home for refusing to remove their abayas — an over-garment from the shoulders to the feet worn by Muslim women — on the first day of the school year, a government minister said yesterday.
Defying a ban on the Muslim robe, nearly 300 girls showed up Monday morning wearing an abaya, Gabriel Attal told the BFM broadcaster.
Most agreed to change out of the robe, but 67 refused and were sent home, he said.
The government announced last month it was banning the abaya in schools, saying it broke the rules on secularism in education that have already seen Muslim headscarves banned on the grounds they constitute a display of religious affiliation.
The move gladdened the political right but the hard-left argued it represented an affront to civil liberties.
Attal said the girls refused entry were given a letter addressed to their families saying that “secularism is not a constraint, it is a liberty”.
If they showed up at school again wearing the abaya there would be a “new dialogue”, the minister said.
President Emmanuel Macron defended the controversial measure, saying there was a “minority” in France who “hijack a religion and challenge the republic and secularism”, leading to the “worst consequences”.
He cited the murder three years ago of teacher Samuel Paty for showing caricatures of the prophet Mohammed during a civics education class. – France24.com
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