By a small majority – the city of Grenoble allows burkini and topless bathing

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On Monday, the city council of the French city of Grenoble approved Muslim full-body bathing suits, so-called burkinis, in public swimming pools. After three and a half hours of controversial debate, a slim majority voted in favor of a corresponding change to the city’s swimming pool rules.

Prefect Laurent Prévost had already announced legal action on Sunday evening if burkinis were given the green light in the public baths of Grenoble. According to the instructions he has received from Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, he will go to the administrative court to have the ordinance suspended, he said.

Critics fear ‘creeping Islamization’
The city’s green mayor, Éric Piolle, started a nationwide burkini debate with the plans. Critics spoke of a creeping Islamization, while Piolle wants to give women the choice to wear as much or as little as they want in the water. Going topless is also allowed in the future.

“We want public offers to be accessible to everyone, we want everyone to be able to bathe ‘topless’, both women and men, and that everyone can bathe covered, women and men,” Piolle told France Info on Monday.

Allowing full-body swimsuits contradicts Republican values, said Prisca Thévenot, a spokeswoman for the ruling LREM party. “Anyone who enters a swimming pool has to follow rules.” One of the most important rules in France is “secularism and equality before the law,” she added.

The topic is discussed again every summer
The word burkini is a combination of bikini and burqa – the full body veil for women demanded by Islamists. The topic is discussed almost every summer in France. In 2016 there was a heated discussion about burkinis, and in some cases a ban.

The Grenoble city council eventually declared a municipal burkini ban, as enacted on the Côte d’Azur, illegal. Communities then used hygiene and safety justifications to continue banning burkinis from beaches and pools.

Source: Krone

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