BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 9. In many Western societies, Muslim women are subjected to various forms of religious discrimination, Head of the Office of the Commissioner for Human Rights (Ombudsman) of Azerbaijan, member of the Independent Standing Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (IPHRC OIC) Aydin Safikhanli said, Trend reports.
First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the conference participants for the interesting, effective and productive discussions they have had over the past two days to combat Islamophobia.
As we know that, discrimination, in all its possible forms and manifestations, is one of the most common forms of human rights violations and abuses. It affects millions of people every day and is one of the most difficult to recognize.
Freedom of religion and religious tolerance are fundamental values in the world, but acts of discrimination based on religion have not yet disappeared. Religious intolerance is often linked to racism and xenophobia, especially Islamophobia.
Today, Islamophobia manifests itself in various aspects and results in gross violations of human rights and freedoms. The effects of Islamophobia on women were more serious and urgent action was needed to address such situations.
I would like to draw attention to the restrictions imposed on the freedom of thought, conscience and religion of Muslim women. This includes restrictions on the dress of Muslim women and multiple forms of discrimination.
In defending the freedom of choice of Muslim women, international organizations must find solutions that would help protect their fundamental rights.
The denial of the rights of Muslim women occurred in the context of the growing Islamophobia in Europe, particularly in France, a problem that disproportionately affected women, who were easily identified as Muslims.
Many European countries had laws prohibiting the wearing of religious dress, and Muslim women also faced indirect pressure from political discourse, social expectations and the media. This is a gross violation of the right to liberty.
Restrictions on religious clothing are often justified within the framework of the neutrality that applies to people of all faiths, but in reality, they are directed only against Muslim women and are part of a broader debate about that Islam is incompatible with Western values. Stigmatization and stereotyping of Muslim women denied them a voice, ignored their diversity and incited hatred that led to harassment and violence. This is evidenced by the increasing number of violent attacks on Muslim women wearing headscarves, as well as their experience of discrimination at work and in other areas of life.
Such cases of discrimination violated the fundamental rights and freedoms of Muslim women, including the right to education.
For example, in 2004, France banned the wearing of religious symbols, including the hijab, in schools, and in 2010 it extended the ban on wearing headscarves in public places.
In a television interview, French Minister of Education Gabriel Attal announced his decision to ban the wearing of Abayas' dresses in schools. He said that "it is impossible to determine the religious affiliation of students at the entrance of the class only by their clothes".
The representative of the French Government, Olivier Veran, also supported this view, calling the Abaya "not only a religious dress but also a political statement".
All this shows that Islamophobia is a French State policy.
Muslim women face violations of their fundamental rights and discrimination on the basis of both religion and gender. Numerous examples show that Muslim women bear the brunt of this intersectional nature of discrimination in their daily lives, also living in societies where gender discrimination remains a major problem.
However, for Muslim women, gender discrimination is often masked as an attempt to promote gender equality, arguing, for example, that women in burqas cannot be free. These arguments deny Muslim women the right to self-determination and rarely allow them to speak for themselves.
In modern Europe, we are now faced with a situation where prejudices based on religion or gender are considered illegal, but an exception is made for Muslim women. Politicians who do not consider it permissible to interfere in the choice of women’s clothing often make judgements about the dress of a Muslim woman.
We are deeply concerned that the gender equality proclaimed in the EU is threatened by increasingly blatant discrimination based on religious beliefs. Some European countries must take a firm stand against any form of religious intolerance and gender inequality.
The stigmatization and exclusion of Muslim women will continue to reinforce social divisions, deepen exclusion and create additional tensions in Europe, which desperately needs greater social participation and the involvement of all sectors of society. A continent that prides itself on the rule of law cannot, above all, continue to witness an open violation of the fundamental rights of part of its population.
The ban on hijab spreads to other fields of life. Athletes representing France would be barred from wearing headscarves during the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris because of the French way of approaching secularism and religious symbols according to French Minister of Sport, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, who highlighted the “representatives of our delegations, in our French teams, will not wear the headscarf”.
Implementation of such policies through institutions legitimizes Islamophobia across various public and private spheres and promotes negative attitudes and discrimination toward Muslims.
Despite the UN declaring the face veil ban as a violation of human rights in 2018 calling for France to review its ban on full-face coverings, and criticizing the latest decision on the 2024 Olympics as discrimination against women, the government continues to justify these restrictions in the name of secularism.
These facts also show the extent to which France has complied with its international obligations.
These measures have fueled a continuing debate about Islamophobia in France, as they appear to disproportionately target Muslims. Islamophobia reports highlight that, to distract society from national issues, Muslims in France often become subjects of political arguments as a threat to secularism. Demonizing Muslims prevents voicing the serious problems Muslim French citizens face in the country. This situation raises critical questions about the balance between protecting secularism as a way to separate church and state and respecting religious freedom, particularly in relation to the Muslim population.
Among many, the prohibition of the hijab in France deserves special attention from various points of view, as it denies Muslim women access to basic institutions such as education and work. Since the hijab is a visible Muslim dress only for women, discrimination against the hijab is considered a form of gender-based Islamophobia, meaning that women experience Islamophobia differently than men. The approach to this issue from the perspective of women’s rights and gender equality is therefore particularly important for understanding the place of Muslim women wearing the hijab in France relative to other women in the country.
In many Western societies, Muslim women are subjected to various forms of religious discrimination. Research shows that religion plays a more important role than race and ethnicity in employment. For example, an experiment in Germany that was conducted with three identical fictional resumes for job applications showed that a Muslim-named résumé and a picture of a hijab were the least suitable compared to those that with a Muslim name and a photo without a hijab, and compared to the CV character with a German name and image.
While the French Muslim women also reported similar experiences in the labor market, compared to other countries, France is a unique case as it does not allow hijab-wearing women to work at any rank in public institutions at all, and the private sector is reluctant to hire these women by taking shelter behind the secularist discourse of the French government. Such policy-driven discrimination leads to systematic disenfranchisement against Muslim women in the French labor market.
I would like to note with regret that such illegal acts, which lead to gross violations of human rights and freedoms, are being supported and reinforced at the State level in France. I believe that international organizations should not remain indifferent to these facts and should prevent such situations.
Dear Conference Participants,
Another issue to which I would like to draw your attention is the special protection of women in international humanitarian law. However, I would like to note with regret that Islamophobia is once again leading to discrimination and gross violations of the human rights of Muslim women under the IHL.
As we know that, in international armed conflicts, women are among those protected by the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War. In these circumstances, they shall benefit from all provisions which enshrine the basic principle of humane treatment, including respect for life and physical and moral integrity, in particular the prohibition of coercion, corporal punishment, torture, collective punishment, repression, robbery and hostage taking.
I would like to note with regret that, for some reason, these commitments have not been taken into account with regard to Muslim women, and that Muslim women suffer most from war crimes.
I would like to inform you that thousands of Azerbaijani Muslim women have been killed and subjected to violence during the war crimes committed as a result of ethnic cleansing and the genocidal policy pursued by Armenia against Azerbaijan in recent decades.
The Azerbaijani women was killed and subjected to violence for the reason that they were Muslims and they were Turks. All these crimes are clear manifestations of Islamophobia and Turkophobia.
As can be seen, the existence of Islamophobia is the cause of gross violations of human rights and freedoms, and each of us must join our efforts to prevent such cases.