French police force Muslim woman to remove burkini

PHOTOS have emerged of armed French police forcing a Muslim woman wearing a burkini on a Nice beach to undress, and could well be among some of the defining images of 2016 with severe repercussions in the near future. 

The images show four fully equipped policemen standing over a woman resting on the Promenade des Anglais beach, while she removes her tunic as white beachgoers look on. 

Authorities in Nice followed the example of other French towns and banned the burkini last week, arguing that clothing overtly connected to a religion had no place in secular France, especially given that the nation is effectively under attack from Islamic extremists.   

The Promenade des Anglais is the site of last month’s horrendous Bastille Day attack which saw 86 people killed by an Islamic terrorist driving a truck. 

Cannes has also banned the garment, designed to protect a woman’s modesty at the beach, and another Muslim woman has reported being forced to remove her clothing there, with locals allegedly jeering and applauding police as she did so. 

Though supported by a broad section of the French, and indeed European, population in principle, seeing the ban in action is only likely to further inflame the already considerable controversy. 

The image will certainly fuel Islamist propaganda and be used by radical preachers as evidence that France is at war, not with terrorism, but with Islam, opening the way for further attacks. 

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Comments


    • raymond welbourn

      24 August 2016 • 18:28

      apparently this womans face was quite open and uncovered. also, other women wear full piece swimsuits. ludicrous

    • Rick

      25 August 2016 • 16:43

      This is now law in France. If we visit the middle eastern countries we have to adhere to their laws.

    • Kally

      26 August 2016 • 02:09

      This is barbaric, degrading. If a woman wants to cover her flesh to avoid creepy men staring at her, forcing her to expose herself is bodily abuse. And since when was what we wear any of the police’s business? It sounds horrific to think that in the 1960s in Benidorm women were arrested for wearing bikinis, but this is worse. One minute we’re told that if we wear short skirts then we’re ‘asking for’ unwanted male attention; next, women who cover themselves to avoid it are forced to undress at gunpoint and in public. If I sat on the beach in jeans and a hoodie, would I be forced to strip in front of men and strangers? What about if I went swimming in a neoprene diving suit and swimming cap? If this is a religious choice, well, freedom of religious expression is enshrined in the Euro Charter of Human Rights. Do I get arrested if I wear something with a cross on it, or fiddle with my rosary beads on the beach? Or wear a sari? What sort of dictatorship bans women from wearing what they want, unless it’s actually indecent? (I agree with bans on bikinis off the beach, or men going topless; have some decorum, folks. But trousers, a top and a headscarf?! Lots of non-Muslim women wear scarves on the beach to protect their hair from sun and wind damage. I’d expect this behaviour in North Korea, or Spain in Franco’s era, but 21st-century France? Stop this NOW! Girls, let’s all wear a burkhini on the beach in protest and solidarity! Nobody should be fined for their clothing choices!

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