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HIJAB

Hijab mural painted over with hair at Swedish mall

A shopping centre in Sweden forced a youth group it had commissioned to paint a mural to cover up a hijab they had put on a woman by concealing it under a new hair style.

Hijab mural painted over with hair at Swedish mall
The centre's management insisted that hair (right) was painted over the hijab (left). Photo: Pia Jönsson/Facebook
“It’s so horrible you almost can’t believe it’s true,” complained Pia Jönsson, whose husband Magnus Heberlein works for a local anti-racism group, in a post on Facebook.
 
“What kind of message are you sending to customers? How can you play into the hands of racists in such a disgusting way.” 
 
According to Jönsson, the management at Burlövs center, just outside Malmö had commissioned UNITY Burlov, and Ungdomsgruppen Burlov, two local youth groups, to paint the murals, which were intended to express the diversity of he local area. 
 
But when the hijab started to appear, the group painting the mural were called in to a meeting and informed that the hijab was not acceptable, as the shopping centre was secular and did not want to display religious symbols.  
 
“The young people are angry and sad. They have grown up in this municipality, and are proud of its diversity and want to show it off as something beautiful. But they have been trampled on.” 
 
The London-based Grosvenor Fund Management, which owns the shopping centre, put out a press release on Saturday apologising for what had happened. 
 
“We apologise that a mural of a woman in a hijab was considered a religious symbol and was therefore altered,” it wrote. “That the picture was changed was unfortunate.” 
 
“For us it is important to welcome all customers regardless of their religion, ethnicity or sex.” 
 

HIJAB

Geneva politicians exempted from religious symbols ban

A Geneva court ruled Tuesday that parliamentarians in the Swiss region could wear visible religious symbols like the Muslim headscarf, exempting them from a "secularism law" adopted by popular vote in February.

Geneva politicians exempted from religious symbols ban
Photo: Depositphotos

Geneva's Court of Justice said in a statement that its Constitutional Chamber had decided to exempt parliamentarians from the ban on public employees wearing visible religious symbols, because they “do not represent the state, but society in its plurality.” 

“Imposing total confessional neutrality on the legislative bodies” would be “harmful to the democratic principle,” the court found. It also ruled that imposing such a level of religious neutrality would be akin to preventing “people who display their religious adherence from acceding to an elected mandate.”

The decision comes after more than 55 percent of voters in the Swiss canton in February backed the controversial new secularism law.

Prior to that vote, the right-leaning cantonal parliament adopted the text, which also had the backing of Geneva's three main religious communities, the Protestant Church, the Roman Catholic Church and the Old Catholic Church.

But the far left, the Greens, feminist organisations, unions and Muslim groups all opposed it, claiming it was discriminatory and warning it might violate the constitution.

They collected enough signatures to force the issue to a public vote.

After the vote, the constitutional chamber received six separate appeals demanding that the law be revoked.

Tuesday's ruling only impacts parliamentarians in Geneva.

Other protests were overruled, and other public servants will still be banned from visibly wearing religious symbols.

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