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Interior minister proposes partial burqa ban

AFP/DPA/The Local
AFP/DPA/The Local - [email protected]
Interior minister proposes partial burqa ban
Photo: DPA

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere came out on Friday in favour of a partial burqa ban amid a fierce national debate on integration.

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"We agree that we reject the burqa, we agree that we want to introduce a legal requirement to show one's face in places where it is necessary for our society's coexistence - at the wheel, at public offices, at the registry office, in schools and universities, in the civil service, in court," he said after a meeting with regional counterparts from his conservative party.

De Maiziere told public television that the full face veil "does not belong in our cosmopolitan country".

"We want to show our faces to each other and that is why we agree that we reject this - the question is how we put this into law," he said.

On Thursday, Chancellor Angela Merkel strongly criticized the conservative Islamic clothing.

“From my point of view, a completely covered woman has almost no chance of integrating herself in Germany,” Merkel told Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland.

But she was more hesitant about suggesting she would like to see a ban on burqas, a garment worn by some Muslim woman in which her whole body is covered, including her eyes.

“This is a question of finding the right political and legal balance - and Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière has my full support in finding a solution,” Merkel said.

De Maiziere indicated that outlawing the burqa only under certain circumstances - as opposed the blanket ban favoured by the hard right of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Union bloc - would be "likely to win approval" in parliament.

Merkel's right-left "grand coalition" holds an overwhelming majority in the Bundestag lower house.

De Maiziere's position represents a compromise with hardliners ahead of two key state elections next month in which the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party looks set to make strong gains.

Just last week he had rejected a call from conservative state interior ministers for a burqa ban, saying: "We can't ban everything that we reject, and I reject the wearing of the burqa."

He made the comments on August 11th as he unveiled tough new anti-terror measures after two attacks in Germany last month claimed by the Islamic State group.

The measures included a controversial proposal to strip jihadist fighters of their German nationality.

The security package also calls for deportations of convicted criminal migrants to be sped up and police resources to be boosted.

The AfD in particular has attempted to link the record influx of migrants and refugees, many from the Middle East, to Germany last year with an increased threat of terrorism - an argument Merkel sharply rejected this week on the campaign trail in her home district.

State interior ministers from Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) called for a ban on the burqa as part of a package of proposed security measures in the wake of several bloody incidents in July, two of which seemingly had Islamist motives behind them.

Lorenz Caffier, interior minister in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, said: “I have seen wide support for a ban in large parts of our society and among my colleagues.”

Critics have said that banning the burqa has nothing to do with fighting terrorism.

Arguments over Islamic clothing have been raging in recent weeks in Europe as six French mayors have banned the burqini, a swimming costume that covers most of the body, in their towns.

In southern Germany in June a swimming pool also banned the burqini, citing hygiene reasons.

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