France’s center-right and left political parties are coalescing around a controversial issue: the idea of a national, parliamentary ban on the niqab.  Proponents of the ban cite the threat of Islamism to France’s position as a secular state, and argue further that the niqab is both a symbol of and an act of the oppression of women.  Opponents claim that banning the niqab is a discriminatory attack on Muslims, and still others point out that banning the public wearing of any article of clothing is a tricky issue and might be impossible under France’s laws.  In many ways the proposed ban signals the fever pitch that has been reached in the debate regarding Islam in France, a debate that resulted in a 2004 ban on headscarves in public schools (a ban that included all overtly religious symbols, including Jewish skullcaps, large Christian crosses, and Sikh turbans) and the denial of citizenship in 2008 for a Muslim woman that wears the niqab, on the grounds that her submission to her male relatives is counter to the sex equality inherent to being French.  

This debate seems to pit several competing rights against each other, and in particular the right of individuals and groups to freely express their religious beliefs in public and the obligation of a State to protect and facilitate this right, and the right to be free from gender based discrimination and the obligation of a State to enact laws and take actions to ensure this right.  The discussion taking place regarding the proposed ban is also uniquely French, given both that the Muslim population in France is the largest in any Western European country and that an estimated 5 million of the 63 million people living in France are Muslim, and France’s strong and often uncompromising position as a secular state suspicious of organized religious groups.  Due to the complex context in which the debate over banning the niqab is taking place, it seems possible that everything is all at once true: it is possible that the garments do represent gender based discrimination, and a threat to France’s secularism, and it is also possible that the attempts to ban them are racist and discriminatory, and a manifestation of French and general European anti-Muslim sentiment. 

France could be targeting Muslims, unfairly discriminating against them, making them bear an unequal burden not experienced by those practicing other religions.  It could be that debates over banning the niqab, arguments about whether “burquinis” (loose bathing suits that cover the full body and hair and are worn by some Muslim woman for modesty while swimming) are sanitary at public swimming pools,  President Sarkozy’s statements that the burqa is not welcome in France, and the deliberate use by politicians and the media of the word burqa as opposed to niqab (the latter is slightly less concealing, as it shows a woman’s eyes) to conjure up Afghanistan and thus fear and antipathy are deliberately and inherently racist and anti-Muslim.  Further, the negative effects of the debates and the bans to date could in themselves be considered additional human rights violations: perhaps the head scarf ban is impairing Muslim girls’ rights to education, or perhaps this debate has a  chilling effect that hinders Muslim women’s rights to work because it stigmatizes them in the eyes of employers.  Evidence demonstrates that after the banning of headscarves in public schools in 2004, Muslim enrollment in Catholic schools increased, because private Catholic schools allow girls to wear headscarves.  But if families cannot afford such schools, or if this increased enrollment represents increased segregation, do these effects imply additional human rights concern? 

On the other hand, what if the proponents of the ban are also correct? What if wearing the niqab flies in the face of France’s secularism and is disruptive to France’s ideas of citizenship? What if most French people feel that when they view a woman wearing a  niqab they are witnessing oppression, and feel that the surest way to remove both such a sign of inequality and the act of it is to ban garment?  If it is true that women and girls are forced by their families to wear such garments–a complex issue that is certainly difficult to get to the bottom of, as one would expect people being controlled to say that they are not–wouldn’t a ban provide the freedom and liberation that cannot be gained otherwise?  Wouldn’t allowing (requiring?) girls to experience education free from the obligation to wear such garments also allow them to experience the option of secular dress, which they might not otherwise have?  And isn’t it a State’s obligation to provide such options in public spaces for all of its inhabitants, regardless of the inhabitant’s religion, creed, ethnicity, national origin, or citizenship status?

And yet–why these garments in particular? Surely there are other garments that present the same set of problems? For that matter, why garments?  Is what women wear the key to their status in society?  If France is particularly concerned about sex equality in public spaces, are Muslim garments the most important issue on which to focus? It would be a rare moment in modern feminist history if the passion with which this issue is being debated was truly, purely, entirely motivated by desires for sex equality.  Unfortunately, women’s rights issues do not typically enjoy this much air time, nor do they garner such fervent support.  The pitch of the debate in France indicates that, even if women’s rights are one motivation for the proposed ban, they are certainly not the only motivation. 

Perhaps these competing ideals and converging forces, many of them discriminatory, are what render the debate regarding Islam in France confused and confusing, impassioned and polarizing.  What is discrimination against women for some French citizens can easily be seen as a right to religious expression by others.  Political parties and governments often manipulate the idea of sex equality when it suits their aims; France justifies its military presence in Afghanistan on such grounds, as did the United States under President Bush, despite the fact that women and girls are often the most harmed by war.  Sex equality concerns often create strange bedfellows, and this would not be the first time the right and left have coalesced on “gender” issues but have been motivated by diametric forces.  And certainly, if a political party or government wants to attack one religion or racial group, they will not say so outright, but will cloak their policies in other, more palatable, more popular terms.  

On the other hand, just because something is a religious practice does not mean it is not oppressive to women, or that people should be free to practice it in any situation. Nor should religions be thought of as unchanging and separate from the worlds and contexts in which they are practiced, but than again, neither should national or political cultures be conceived as static; perhaps it is France’s laïcité that should bend to its changing demographic.  Certainly there should be some rational reasons behind the decision to preserve one and ban the other, rather than tradition or continuity for its own sake. 

It will be informative to see whether or not the proposed ban on the niqab is found illegal under existing French laws.  As other parts of Western Europe, such as Denmark and Germany, continue to expand bans on garments worn publicly by Muslim women for religious reasons, the outcome of France’s current parliamentary proposal could have a wider regional significance.  A decision on the proposed ban could clarify lines drawn between private practice and truly public spaces, such as streets.  On the other hand, if equally valid human rights are at odds in this scenario, it will be difficult for the parliament or courts to weigh them against each other without using political reasons to reach a conclusion as to which should prevail.  

Guatemala can be considered a vanguard country in ensuring the right to food, in that it has developed legal and institutional protections designed to protect and promote this right. Several national laws exist to promote and ensure the right to food, such as the law (SINESAN) to operationalize the national food security and nutrition plan (PSAN), which declares the right of every person to adequate food.  The right to food is further supported through Guatemala’s ratification of international instruments codifying the right, such as the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, and the supremacy that the Guatemalan Constitution lends to such international legal documents.  The government has dedicated institutional resources to the issue, such as establishing the Center for Food Security and Nutrition Information and Coordination (Centro de Información y Coordinación en  Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutricional (CICSAN)) and a council to implement the national food security and nutrition plan (CONASAN.)  Legally and institutionally, Guatemala seems to have taken positive steps forward to ensure the right to food within its borders.  

Yet, despite legal protections and persons charged with the task, the latest reports from UNICEF indicate that Guatemalan children suffer from some of the highest malnutrition and stunting rates in the world.  Children of Mayan decent are the hardest hit, and in some rural Mayan communities, up to 80% of the children suffer from malnutrition.  The Guatemalan government has conducted a partial national mapping of hunger and malnutrition, a necessary step for targeting right to food programs to those most immediately in need.  In spite of this, the government does not seem to be reaching the Mayan population.  The Economist argued on August 27 that, financially, Guatemala is wealthy enough to have reduced its hunger levels, and points out that other Latin American countries such as Bolivia, Peru, and Brazil have all made improvements in reducing child malnutrition that Guatemala has yet to match.  The fact that Mayan children suffer disproportionately and that government commitment and financial resources have been mobilized to address the issue points to continued ethnic discrimination and the harmful and lasting effects of income disparity. 

The case of child nutrition in Guatemala seems to illustrate the problem of good laws and dedicated institutions failing to reach the most marginalized members of society.  The Mayan population, and especially the rural female Mayan population, remain the poorest Guatemalans.   It is no coincidence that the Mayan population were also the main victims of Guatemala’s recent decade of civil war: the current child malnutrition problem demonstrates that this population continue to suffer the conflict’s after effects, such as a persistent and extreme income gap between Mayan groups and the rest of the population.  What is needed is renewed government commitment to the most vulnerable populations.  Children in particular are forever damaged by malnutrition, and thus the case of child hunger should be treated with urgency, as its ill effects cannot be reversed.  Guatemala has already made legal commitments to the right to food, and has established institutional capacity to tackle the issue.  The Guatemalan government should take steps to reach the most endangered populations from within this existing framework.

Amidst what appears to be a confusion of evidence and a disregard for both the pressures faced by girls sold into marriage and the inherently dual victim-perpetrator status of children in conflict situations, Rania Ibrahim, a 16-year-old Iraqi teenage girl, has been sentenced to seven and a half years in prison for an attempted suicide bombing. Rania was discovered wearing an explosives vest when she was 15. U.S. Army reports state that she turned herself in, and police and media accounts suggest both that she might have been drugged and that her husband’s relatives had forced the explosives onto her. A juvenile court in Iraq recently handed down her sentence one year after the arrest.

There are several disturbing features of Rania’s case. The first is what appears to be the failing of the juvenile court that tried her to consider exonerating evidence, such as the testimony of U.S. officials that she had turned herself in and the statement of at least one Iraqi police officer that she had been drugged. Both pieces of evidence seem to indicate her non-compliance in the bombing attempt. A video of her confession and reports of her trial reveal Rania’s insistence that female relatives of her husband had strapped the explosives to her and instructed her in how to use them. Additionally, the U.S. military had previously stated that Rania was an “unwilling suicide bomber” who had been either tricked or forced into the attempted attack. Major Ghalib al-Karkhi, a provincial police spokesman, reported that the court ignored these facts and Rania’s testimony and focused instead on the fact that she had been in possession of the explosives. It appears that the court thus entirely disregarded her defense.

The other disturbing facet of Rania’s case is the court’s seeming indifference for her position within her family, society, and Iraq’s conflict, and of the international human rights law relevant to this position. Rania received schooling only up until the age of 11 and had been sold into marriage 5 months prior to the attempted suicide bombing. Her youth, education level, the fact that she was forced into marriage, and women’s unequal position within Iraqi society, marriage and family must be taken into account both when assessing the evidence and determining her level of responsibility and culpability. Her relative lack of power based on education, gender, and age lend support to the evidence indicating that she was forced or tricked into the bombing attempt. Rania’s status as a child forced into marriage should also be given considerable weight. International human rights law, such as that embodied in the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women, opposes child marriage because it interferes with the rights of a child to obtain the highest levels of physical and mental health, to education, and to control over her or his sexual reproduction. The court’s refusal to consider Rania’s vulnerability to manipulation at the hands of her family demonstrates complacency to the plight of child brides and gender-based discrimination.

An added dimension of Rania’s case is the complex position that child combatants occupy. It is not clear that Rania should be considered as a combatant or a war criminal, as Human Rights Watch would have us classify suicide bombers, because there is evidence that she was used in this role rather than having assumed it herself. Her age alone renders her ability to choose the role of combatant suspect. While international law does not expressly prohibit the prosecution of children considered to have committed war crimes, the Paris Principles and Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces or Armed Groups states that children accused of such crimes should be considered primarily as victims rather than perpetrators, given that the recruitment of children for conflict violates their rights and causes them immense harm. The Paris Principles give special attention to the added stigma and danger faced by female child combatants.

All of these dimensions of Rania’s particular situation, together with the evidence that she was forced to carry the bombs against her will, should have been taken into account by the court. This could have been an opportunity for a court to recognize the overlapping vulnerabilities faced by someone in Rania’s position. Instead, it appears that they have sentenced her for being a victim.  As such, Rania’s sentence will do nothing to end the use of children in suicide bombings or improve the security of Iraq, and is likely a violation of her human rights.