Quebec will refuse all government services, including education and non-emergency health care, to fully veiled Muslim women under legislation tabled yesterday in the National Assembly. Jean Charest, the Liberal Premier, said the bill establishing guidelines for the accommodation of religious minorities is aimed at “drawing a line” to demonstrate that gender equality is a paramount…
A new type of warfare – albeit perfectly peaceful – has taken form in Quebec, as intellectuals and academics weigh in on the issue of accommodating religious minorities. The debate has been reignited recently with the “ niqab ” incident, in which a woman who refused to show her face to her language teacher and…
According to a new poll from Léger Marketing-Le Devoir, three-quarters of Quebecers feel that the Charest provincial government is too lenient in its “reasonable accommodation” of religious minorities. 57 percent of respondents agreed that the provincial government should ban religious signs in government-related offices. The poll results are not yet available to the public through…
In a contribution to a debate in Norwegian Aftenposten, Editor and Media Researcher Knut Olav Åmås writes that ethnic and religious minorities in Norway are being categorized – and tend to categorize themselves – in terms of their religious or ethnic belonging. Columnists of Muslim background feel forced to discuss religious issues and claim to…
In Turkey, the Swiss referendum banning the building of new minarets is perceived as just another example of Islamophobia and discrimination against Muslims. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said: “This decision is primitive, outdated, and manifestation of a Western understanding.” Warning that this decision rings alarm bells, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu added “There is an…
