Portugal bans burqas: Wearing face veils for ‘gender or religious reasons’ will bring fine of up to £3,475

Portugal’s parliament has approved a bill banning the wearing of veils in public for ‘gender or religious’ reasons, and people who wear veils could face hefty fines.

The measure was proposed by the far-right Chega party and would ban veils such as burqas (a full-body garment that covers women from head to toe) and niqabs (an Islamic veil that covers the entire face with space around the eyes) from being worn in most public places.

The wearing of veils will still be allowed on airplanes, in diplomatic buildings and places of worship.

The bill imposes a fine of up to 4,000 euros or £3,475 for those who wear veils in public.

President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa still must approve the bill. He can veto it or send it to the Constitutional Court for review.

If the law comes into force, Portugal will join a number of European countries that have imposed full or partial bans on face coverings and headscarves, including Austria, France, Belgium and the Netherlands.

Many women in Portugal do not wear such veils, but the issue of the Islamic veil causes controversy, as in other European countries.

Chega touched upon the reasons why France and other EU countries banned face masks commonly used by Muslim women.

The far-right Portuguese party received support for the bill from centre-right parties.

Chega said in his bill that hiding the face subjects individuals, especially women, to ‘conditions of exclusion and inferiority’ and is incompatible with principles such as ‘freedom, equality and human dignity’.

MPs from left-leaning parties opposed this view.

“This initiative is only used to target foreigners with different beliefs,” said center-left Socialist Party lawmaker Pedro Delgado Alves, whose party voted against the bill.

He said that no woman should be forced to wear the veil, but that the far-right party’s approach was wrong.

The bill comes in the same week that Sweden’s deputy prime minister called for a burqa ban ‘while we can’, saying the country’s ‘integration has failed’.

Ebba Busch, leader of the Christian Democrats, has suggested that the Scandinavian country should ban women from wearing burqas and veils in public and that this is an unwelcome ‘oppression’.

He added that the headscarf should be banned in public areas such as streets and squares, shopping malls and health facilities.

Portugal’s proposed bill would impose fines of up to 4,000 euros, or £3,475, for those who wear veils in public. File photo: A woman wearing a type of veil while walking down the street

Local municipalities in Sweden have previously tried to impose restrictions on the burqa, including in schools, but there are currently no nationwide restrictions.

Ms Busch, who also serves as the country’s Minister of Energy and Minister of Trade and Industry, said she believed the headscarf was incompatible with Swedish society and was ‘an expression of the strict interpretation of Islam practiced in totalitarian states such as Iran and Afghanistan’.

‘If you are on the street, shopping in the square, if you are in the Ica store, if you are taking the children to the health center, you should be able to meet in real terms. “So I don’t want to meet someone who covers his entire face,” he told Swedish outlet Aftonbladet.

The proposal would be part of an effort to increase ‘social cohesion’ in the country where ‘integration has failed’.

‘It is a very naïve liberalism or lax social policy that has brought Sweden to the situation we are in today,’ Ms. Busch added.

He said around 70,000 women in the Nordic countries suffered from female genital mutilation and that ‘while being Muslim in Sweden is welcome… if you are already in the country you have to adapt to it’.

Sweden’s offer comes after Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni called for a ban on burqas and niqabs in public places in Italy and a £2,600 fine to stop ‘Islamic separatism’.

Earlier this month, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni called for a ban on burqas and niqabs in public places in Italy

The bill, introduced to parliament earlier this month by the Italian prime minister’s Brothers of Italy party, calls for fines of between £260 and £2,600 for those who wear the garment in shops, offices, schools and universities.

Additionally, criminal sanctions will be introduced for ‘cultural crimes’, including virginity testing, and penalties for forced marriages will be increased to up to 10 years in prison, with religious oppression grounds for prosecution.

The party claims the bill will combat ‘religious radicalization and religiously motivated hatred’.