Veil ban stays

last updated 8 January 2015

Paris

France said this week that it would not give in to hostage takers who want the country to repeal its ban on head scarves in schools. Insurgents in Iraq took two French journalists hostage last week and demanded that France allow Muslim girls to wear scarves in public schools. All crosses, yarmulkes, head scarves, and other religious symbols are banned in schools under France’s laws on secularism. French Muslim groups oppose the ban, but they all condemned the Iraqi kidnapping. “This is a national debate that should be settled at a national level,” said Abdelaziz Jawari, a member of France’s Committee for the Muslim Religion.