Azerbaijan, Baku, January 13 / Trend News, E.Ostapenko /

The French parliament is likely to approve the ban and fines for wearing clothes - burqa and niqab by country's Muslim, which most experts regard as a violation of freedom of choice and religion.

"Criminalising women's choice of dress is a grave violation of women's freedom, Nicola Pratt, Associate Professor of the International Politics of the Middle East, told Trend News. Making women take off the burqa or niqab is just as bad as making women wear such clothing."

On Tuesday, the French Parliament introduced a draft law providing for a fine of 700 euros (over $1,000) for wearing burqa or nigab in public places and streets (except social events and carnivals). The man who makes his wife to wear such clothes will be fined in more amounts.

Burqa (or paranja), distributed mainly in Afghanistan, is a veil with the hair mesh for the eyes which completely covers a woman from prying eyes. Niqab is a Muslim woman's headdress that covers the face, but leaves a slit for the eyes.

Leader of the ruling conservative faction of the French parliament - the Union for a Popular Movement, Jean-Francois Cope, initiated the ban. He believes the adoption of the law would better ensure public safety. However, observers believe that if the bill passes, it will be challenged in the European Court of Human Rights.

The French Parliament will pass the legislation proscribing the burqa and niqab, said professor on freedom of religion at the University of Cambridge Paul Diamond, explaining that this tendency started in France six years ago, when the government banned the wearing of headscarf in schools.

These measures were premised on the French principle of secularism, he wrote to Trend News in an email.

The French Parliament will support the move, since the Muslim attitude to women is incompatible with the free and easy customs and practices of Western states, said Kenneth Minogue, who studies ideology in Europe.

"To have an entire class of human beings excluded from public life, as is the Muslim custom, is not tolerable in the West," Minogue, London School of Economics and Political Science, wrote to Trend News in an email.

The decision to ban burqa or niqab is a political one, believes the head of the European Center for Mediterranean Basin Research Awad Chamas.

"Europe now has a hostile attitude towards Islam. Prohibiting the full veil, the minarets and the publication of the cartoons is part of a process aimed against Islam," Chamas told Trend News by telephone from Brussels.

According to Chamas, the decision to ban traditional Muslim women's clothes was dictated by the concerns of European society over the active spread of Islam in Europe.

The debates in France over Muslim clothes are not something unexpected. Six years ago, the Muslim community of France was shocked by the law prohibiting wearing headscarf at public schools. Together with hijab (headscarf) were also banned Christian crosses and Jewish bales.

In August last year, French authorities banned Muslim women to swim in public swimming pool in "burqini" - with bathing suit, fully covering the body, resembling a bathing suit with a hood.

Both European governments and the Muslim community itself have descended from the true path, said European expert on the ideology of Islam in the West Shada Islam. The law on ban and fines will not solve the underlying problem - the integration of Muslim communities into European society, she said.

"The actual priority of integration, of creating a cohesive, inclusive society, all those major concerns which are linked to social peace and harmony are being totally sidelined and forgotten by the governments in Europe and also by the Muslim communities," she said, adding that employment and education are the key issues where integration has to take place.

The largest Muslim community in Europe lives in France, numbering about five million people. Every tenth Frenchman is Muslim. But the number of women wearing full veil in France is very small. According to the Interior Ministry, the number of fully covered women all over France is around 2000 from the general population - about 62 million.

So, the governments are focusing the marginal problem which may be tackled in a more harmonious way inside the Muslim community. Discussions about women empowerment, women liberation, women in Islam could be discussed inside the common space.

U.Sadikhova, E.Tariverdiyeva contributed to the article.