France’s highest administrative court on Friday suspended a ban on full-body burkini swimsuits that has outraged Muslims and opened divisions within the government, pending a definitive ruling.
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The Council of State today reversed the ban, stating French Mayors do not have the authority to put such a rule in place.
France has long-standing laws on secularism, and the Nice ban focused on “correct dress, respectful of accepted customs and secularism, as well as rules of hygiene and of safety in public bathing areas”.
In its ruling the court said the ban “has dealt a serious and clearly illegal blow to fundamental liberties such as the freedom of movement, freedom of conscience and personal liberty”.
Mayors of French towns who banned the controversial “burkini” swimsuit have been warned they must heed a court ruling suspending the action. France’s Human Rights League (LDH) and the Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) appealed this decision Thursday, arguing the proscription on the full-body swimwear favored by some Muslim women infringed on individuals’ basic freedoms.
“The decision by the Council of State is normal. Liberty? You telling us what to wear, you telling us what not to do will drive women back into their homes – what do you want us to do then?”, she said.
The debate was fuelled by footage of police trying to enforce the ban on a woman on a beach in Nice.
Human rights lawyer Patrice Spinosi said if any mayors did not comply, he would take each case to court.
It took days to untangle the events leading to the violence that many immediately assumed was over a burkini siting.
France’s Prime Minister Manuel Valls, for example, said that the veil spreads an “ideological message” and is akin to the “enslavement of women”.
United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric said it was a welcome development. For example, the woman who was fined at Nice was only wearing a headscarf, a blue tunic and black trousers.
“Far from calming, this decision can only heighten passions and tensions, with the risk of trouble we wanted to avoid”, he says.
Former President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is seeking the conservative nomination for the 2017 race, also said he would bring in a nationwide burkini ban if elected to his former post.
Muslim advocates, while welcoming the decision to overturn the ban in Villeneuve-Loubet, expressed their concern that the Islamophobia that prompted the ban will emerge in other forms.
In mid-August, mayors of dozens of coastal towns imposed the ban on wearing the burkini which leaves only the face, hands and feet uncovered.
Amnesty hailed the move as “an important line in the sand” while Le Pen insisted the battle is not over, the Associated Press reports.
The bans on the beachwear have sparked controversy in France and worldwide.
In response, women spoke out to reporters and across Twitter - pointing out that, despite French politicians’ attempt to cloak the ban in feminism as a way of liberating women, it was in truth another way for people to tell women what they were allowed to wear.
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Images this week that showed Nice police appearing to instruct a burkini-clad beachgoer to remove her tunic stirred indignation online.
