Quebec Premier François Legault says he would not “truly” consider Muslim girls within the province who say they have got been the goal of Islamophobic incidents because the authorities passed a regulation making it unlawful for some civil servants to put on spiritual symbols.
Several Muslim ladies who wear either the hijab or niqab have informed CBC News that since the regulation changed into tabled in March, they’ve been careworn, made the target of hateful remarks, even spat on.
A girls’ advocacy group, Justice Femme, recorded greater than 40 Islamophobic incidents around Montreal between late March and early May.
Muslim community leaders have shared testimonies on social media that propose the incidents of harassment have now not died down inside the weeks for the reason that the law came into effect.
Legault changed into requested Thursday on CBC Radio whether he believes the brand new regulation — which bars public teachers and other authority figures from sporting religious symbols — makes some Quebecers extra susceptible to racism.
“For the human beings handling this invoice … They say that they’ve obtained an extra level of harassment and intimidation or even assaults for the reason that bill exceeded,” the host of CBC Montreal’s Daybreak, Ainslie MacLellan, informed Legault.
Comparisons to Europe
The top of the line explained the nonsecular symbols regulation as mild because it applies best to a small number of civil servants: public school teachers, faculty principals, authorities attorneys, law enforcement officials, judges and wildlife officers are prohibited from wearing symptoms in their religion.
He turned into regarding legal guidelines in Belgium that ban face-overlaying veils in public. A comparable ban exists in France, where it’s also illegal for students and instructors to put on nonsecular symbols in country faculties. Several German states have implemented their personal limits on where spiritual symbols can be worn.
“When I pay attention to some human beings saying that Quebec [is becoming] racist, does that suggest Germany, France, and Belgium are racist?” Legault asked.
A separate interview — a televised change with CBC Montreal News at 6 host Debra Arbec — Legault counseled that the dearth of regulations on nonsecular symbols is partially guilty for the upward push of right-wing extremism within the U.S.
“They do not have the kind of law we put in place or that they put in the vicinity in France, and they have extremism,” Legault said. “Even the president from time to time has said remarks that can be near racism.”
(Legault made no point out of the results of the recent European parliamentary elections, wherein an anti-immigrant, a long way-proper party, gained the biggest percentage of the vote in France.)
The optimal described Quebec’s law as a “framework” to help exclude racist views from mainstream debate.