The French Authorities’s choice to cease its athletes from sporting the hijab on the Paris Olympics has been criticised by consultants appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council. The United Nations rights consultants additionally hit out on the choice of the French soccer and basketball associations to bar athletes who selected to put on the hijab.
“The neutrality and secular nature of the State aren’t authentic grounds for imposing restrictions on the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of faith or perception. Any limitations of those freedoms have to be proportionate, crucial to achieve one of many goals acknowledged in worldwide regulation” the consultants mentioned, including that they need to by no means be primarily based on “presumptions, assumptions or prejudices,” un.org quoted the consultants as stating.
France invoked secularism guidelines to ban its athletes from sporting non secular symbols, together with the hijab, in the course of the Paris Olympics.
“Muslim girls and women who put on the hijab will need to have equal rights to take part in cultural and sporting life, and to participate in all features of French society of which they’re an element,” mentioned the assertion, signed by eight unbiased UN consultants.
French sprinter Sounkamba Sylla was allowed to take part within the Paris Olympics’ opening ceremony after she agreed to put on a cap to cowl her hair.
“In session with the French Athletics Federation, the French Ministry of Sports activities, Paris 2024, and Berluti, discussions had been held with Sounkamba Sylla,” the French Olympic Committee mentioned Thursday in an announcement. “She was supplied the potential of sporting a cap in the course of the parade, which she accepted.”
Earlier, 26-year-old Sylla, a member of the 400 metre relay groups, had vented her frustration on Instagram.
“You’re chosen for the Olympics, organized in your nation, however you possibly can’t take part within the opening ceremony since you put on a scarf,” she wrote.
