“Muslim women and girls who wear the hijab must have equal rights to participate in cultural and sporting life,” say the UN experts.
United Nations rights experts have described France‘s decisions barring women and girls wearing the Muslim headscarf from sporting events as “discriminatory”, demanding they be reversed.
France has invoked its strict “secularism” rules to ban its athletes from wearing religious symbols, including the hijab, during the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
France’s football and basketball federations have also chosen to ban headscarf-wearing players from competitions, including at amateur level.
These decisions “are disproportionate and discriminatory and violate the rights of French athletes to freely express their identity, religion or belief in private and public and to participate in cultural life,” said the statement, signed by eight independent experts of the UN and was issued on Monday 28 October.
“Women and girls who wear the hijab must have equal rights to participate in cultural and sporting life and take part in all aspects of the French society of which they are a part,” they said.
These experts are independent experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, but do not speak on behalf of the UN.
Secularism vs. freedom
France’s secularism laws aim to keep the state neutral on religious matters while guaranteeing citizens the right to practice their religion freely.
Among other things, they prohibit students and teachers in schools, as well as civil servants from wearing “ostentatious” religious symbols.
However, the experts insisted that “state neutrality and secularism are not legitimate grounds for imposing restrictions on the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of religion or belief.”
“Any limitation of these freedoms must be proportionate, necessary to achieve one of the objectives stated in international law – security, health and public order, rights and freedoms of others – and justified by facts … and not by presumptions, assumptions or prejudices,” they said.
“In a context of intolerance and strong stigmatization of women and girls who choose to wear the hijab, France must take all measures at its disposal to protect them, safeguard their rights and promote equality and mutual respect cultural diversity”.
The French delegation to the Paris Olympics did not include any hijab-wearing athletes. However, the International Olympic Committee allowed female participants to wear the hijab in the sports village.
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