2002-05-06
Raffarin emerges from behind scenes to take prime minister's post With BC-France-Election
(APW_ENG_20020506.0401)
1) A media-savvy businessman turned politician, Jean-Pierre Raffarin rose quietly through France's political ranks over nearly three decades, making few enemies and showing he has a way with words.
2) As the interim prime minister of France, Raffarin will use his people skills to help newly re-elected President Jacques Chirac try to score a vital victory for the right in next month's legislative elections.
3) Chirac appointed Raffarin, 53, almost immediately after Socialist Lionel Jospin handed in his resignation.
4) Raffarin, of the center-right Liberal Democracy party, will head a new conservative government that is expected to quickly crack down on the country's rising crime.
5) A senator and former minister for small business, Raffarin is largely unknown outside political circles. Colleagues describe him as intelligent and modest, a consensus-builder who has rubbed few colleagues the wrong way.
6) Asked earlier Monday how he would respond if asked to assume the role of prime minister, Raffarin said it would be impossible to turn down.
7) ``These are functions that one cannot refuse when one is involved in a political struggle,'' he said.
8) One of Raffarin's visions for France is opening markets to greater free trade, a position that may put him at odds with the country's considerable anti-globalization movement.
9) After working for years as a marketing director for several companies, Raffarin entered politics in 1976 to work as a minister's spokesman.
10) In 1988, Raffarin took up local politics as the assistant mayor of Chasseneuil-du-Poitou, in the western region of France where he was born.
11) The following year he became a member of the European Parliament.
12) In 1995 he became the general secretary of the conservative UDF party. When internal problems caused the party to split, Raffarin moved to the Liberal Democracy party _ the smallest party on the right _ where he soon became vice-president in 1997.
13) Raffarin emerged as a favorite for prime minister during this year's presidential race, which pitted Chirac against far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen.
2002-12-10
France moves to coax Islamic organizations to speak with single voice
(APW_ENG_20021210.0485)
1) France may be nearing a long-sought agreement among the country's numerous Islamic organizations to speak with one voice through a single body that represents all Muslims here.
2) Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said Monday night that an accord in principle had been signed earlier in the day with the three largest organizations aimed at creating a structure to represent the Muslim religion.
3) Consultations to do just that had been in progress for nearly three years but failed to settle feuds among the various strains of Islam, which range from modern to fundamentalist and receive backing from several different Arab governments.
4) According to Sarkozy, interviewed on France-2 television, an accord was signed Monday by the Paris Mosque, which is backed by Algeria, the National Federation of Muslims of France and the Union of Islamic Organizations of France, considered close to Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood.
5) The three groups are to meet Dec. 19-20 at the official residence of the interior minister to work out details, the newspaper Le Monde reported Tuesday.
6) The Interior Ministry had no comment.
7) There are some 5 million Muslims in France, the largest such community in Europe. Their diverse voices have made it difficult for the government to communicate on official issues, all the more so because Islam has no hierarchy _ not the case with Jews and Roman Catholics.
8) Sarkozy said he was hoping that a single body representing the various organizations could be created by the end of the year.
9) However, signs that he might have set his hopes too high emerged quickly.
10) Soheib Bencheikh, head of Marseille's mosque which is one of France's largest, said on France-Info radio that he was ``very, very skeptical'' that a sole representation could be created out of so many voices with so many interests.
11) In France, the interior minister oversees religions.
12) (eg-ad)
2003-02-26
2003-03-31
French prime minister says Paris and Washington `not enemies'
(APW_ENG_20030331.0208)
1) France's outspoken opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq does not mean that Paris and Washington are enemies, the French prime minister said Monday.
2) In the second high-profile French reaffirmation in recent days of close ties with the United States, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin also denied that Paris wants Iraq to win the war.
3) ``Just because we're against this war doesn't mean we hope for the victory of dictatorship over democracy,'' Raffarin said. ``Our side is for democracy.''
4) Raffarin's comments to local elected officials in Clermont-Ferrand, 420 kilometers (260 miles) south of Paris, echoed the Foreign Ministry's protest last week of media reports saying France's support for U.S.-led forces was ambiguous.
5) In London last week, Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin refused to directly answer a question about which side France supported. But the ministry said on Friday that France's support for the United States was clear.
6) France led opposition to military action against Iraq in the U.N. Security Council, and has since suggested the war is illegal. But Raffarin reiterated that did not translate into seeing the United States as a foe.
7) ``I have already said that the Americans are not the enemy,'' Raffarin said. ``Make no mistake about it.''
8) However, the prime minister stood by France's position that such military action should not be taken without the lawful approval of the United Nations.
9) He also raised worries about how ferocious the war may become.
10) ``We see that this war resembles atrociously all other wars ... with their violence, their brutalities and their horrors,'' Raffarin said.
11) (parf-jc-eg)
2003-04-06
French Muslims to elect representatives for first unified body
(APW_ENG_20030406.0159)
1) Muslim officials around France cast votes Sunday to select the leaders of a long-awaited official body that will represent Islam's diverse factions and serve as a link to the French government
2) The two-stage election, which started Sunday and wraps up a week later, comes after a deal was reached in December to create a single representative body that could give Islam a unified voice in France _ achieving a goal of successive governments since 1989.
3) The vote also comes amid mounting concern that the U.S.-led war against Iraq could have a backlash in France, where Islam is the second religion after Roman Catholicism.
4) A poll of French Muslims published in Le Figaro newspaper's weekend edition showed that 94 percent of respondents disapproved of the war in Iraq, and 72 percent said they did not want to see a U.S. victory.
5) The French Muslim council, known by the acronym CFCM, is seen as a crucial step in France's efforts to satisfy the needs of the country's 5 million Muslims, address their grievances and thwart the growth of Islamic fundamentalism.
6) Unlike Roman Catholicism or Judaism, Islam in France has no hierarchical structure and therefore no single representative.
7) Instead, there are numerous squabbling groups, associations and federations backed variously by Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia _ former French colonies _ or even Pakistan.
8) Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Mosque of Paris, was expected to become president of the body.
9) In the two-stage election that started Sunday and continues April 13, a group of 4,042 delegates from France's 1,300 mosques were voting to select the council's regional and national representatives.
10) The election will result in a 206-member general assembly and a 60-member administrative council. The officials, nominated for two-year terms, will then appoint a governing 16-member executive council.
11) There was no precise timeframe for establishing the governing structure, but it was expected to take several months.
12) Le Figaro newspaper made the council's election the lead story of its weekend edition, advertising the results of its poll with the banner headline, ``What French Muslims Think.''
13) Asked who they sided with in the war against Iraq, 62 percent of respondents chose Iraq, while a mere 5 percent sided with the United States and Britain.
14) The telephone poll of 523 people conducted April 1-3 did not provide a margin of error, but polls of that size usually have margins of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
15) (parf-jg)
2003-04-14
Fundamentalist Muslims make strong showing in French Islamic vote
(APW_ENG_20030414.0549)
1) A fundamentalist Muslim party made an unexpectedly strong showing in elections for a new council to represent France's various Islamic factions, according to results released Monday.
2) The Union of Islamic Organizations of France _ inspired by Egypt's banned fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood _ took 19 seats in the 58-seat council in Sunday's vote, the Interior Ministry results said.
3) Another slightly less conservative party close to Morocco won 20 seats, while the moderate, Algerian-backed Mosque of Paris, which had been considered a favorite, won just 15 seats.
4) The setting up of the council _ decided in two voting rounds April 6 and 13 _ is seen as a crucial step in France's effort to address the concerns of one of Europe's largest Muslim communities.
5) Unlike Roman Catholicism or Judaism, Islam has no hierarchical structure in France, and therefore no leadership that can directly communicate concerns or grievances to the government.
6) A total of 3,252 representatives, including clerics and imams, of the country's 5 million Muslims were eligible to vote Sunday. Turnout was 85 percent, the ministry said.
7) Under an agreement reached by Muslim leaders in December, however, the council will initially be presided by the head of the Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur.
8) ``Today, Muslims have won,'' said Khalil Merroun, rector of the Evry mosque, southwest of Paris. ``After having learnt to coexist and understand each other, we must now learn to work together.''
9) France's Muslims have been led by numerous squabbling groups, associations and federations backed variously by Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia _ former French colonies _ or even Pakistan.
10) Previous efforts to unite the various factions failed due to internal differences.
11) But some groups, such as the Union of Young Muslims, or UJM, have refused to take part in the conference, citing the influence of foreign countries and French government meddling.
12) ``We are scandalized by this process,'' said Abdelaziz Chaambi, a UJM spokesman.
13) Malek Boutih, the president of anti-racism group SOS Racisme, said he doesn't believe the council can legitimately speak for French Muslims because it was chosen by only a handful of representatives.
14) ``We don't know, through this election, the opinion of the masses of Muslims living in France since they weren't invited to vote,'' he said.
15) Boutih said he was surprised by the success of the fundamentalist party, but attributed its strong showing to the movement's influence on the streets and in mosques.
16) (parf-kh-jc)
2003-04-16
France threatens to expel extremist Islamic leaders
(APW_ENG_20030416.0203)
1) Worried by the growth of Islamic fundamentalism in France, the country's interior minister has threatened to expel any foreign Muslim religious leader who disseminates extremist propaganda.
2) Nicolas Sarkozy issued the warning after the unexpectedly strong showing of a Muslim fundamentalist party in weekend elections for a new council to represent France's various Islamic factions and serve as a link to the government.
3) The Union of Islamic Organizations of France _ inspired by Egypt's banned fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood _ took 19 seats in the 58-seat council in a vote Sunday. The moderate, Algerian-backed Mosque of Paris, which had been considered a favorite, won just 15 seats.
4) ``We want to say very simply: imams who propagate views that run counter to French values will be expelled,'' he told Europe-1 radio on Tuesday. A majority of Muslim leaders in France are of foreign nationality, according to the Interior Ministry.
5) Sarkozy, a no-nonsense law-and-order minister who was instrumental in creating the council, said he was determined to curb the influence of extremism on one of Europe's largest Muslim communities.
6) He said he would not allow the council to be used as a vehicle to spread extremist views, notably Islamic sharia law.
7) ``Islamic law will be applied nowhere because it is not the law of the (French) Republic,'' he said.
8) The setting up of the council _ decided in two voting rounds April 6 and 13 _ is seen as a crucial step in France's effort to address the concerns of its five million Muslims.
9) Unlike Roman Catholicism or Judaism, Islam has no hierarchical structure in France, and therefore no leadership that can directly communicate concerns or grievances to the government.
10) The lack of structure, for instance, has forced thousands of Muslims around France to practice their faith in makeshift underground prayer rooms simply because there aren't enough mosques.
11) ``If fundamentalism or extremism has spread so much, it is because we condoned an Islam of cellars and garages,'' Sarkozy said.
12) Part of the council's purpose is to oversee the building of more mosques and encourage foreign imams to learn French.
13) But Sarkozy also made clear the government will keep a close watch on the new council's activities and expects it to abide by French law.
14) ``It is precisely because we recognize the right of Islam to sit at the table of the (French) Republic that we will not accept any misconduct,'' he said.
15) Under an agreement hammered out by Sarkozy before the elections, the council will initially be presided over by the head of the Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur, a moderate.
16) (parf-kh-jg)
2003-04-20
Islamic leader urges Muslims to 'live with the times' after minister booed
(APW_ENG_20030420.0310)
1) The designated head of a new Islamic council called Sunday on French Muslims to ``live with the times'' after a government minister was booed for remarks about wearing headscarves.
2) Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy was hooted and whistled at on Saturday when he reminded a meeting of Muslims that French law does not allow women to wear headscarves in identity card photos.
3) ID card photos ``must be bareheaded, no matter whether they are of a man or a woman,'' Sarkozy said at the gathering outside Paris of the Union of Islamic Organizations of France.
4) ``Nothing would justify a different law to benefit Muslim women for the national identity card,'' he said.
5) Sarkozy noted that the law applies to other religions, too. He was addressing a crowd packed with women wearing Islamic headscarves.
6) The minister's comments were backed Sunday by Dalil Boubakeur, who heads the Mosque of Paris and will preside initially over a new council to represent France's various Islamic factions and serve as a link to the government.
7) ``If there are laws, we will make it our duty to obey them,'' he said on France Info radio. ``It is really necessary to live with the times.''
8) France prides itself on a long tradition of separating religion and state. Previously, debate about wearing headscarves had centered mostly on whether girls should be allowed to cover their hair in the Islamic tradition while at school.
9) (parf-jl)
2003-05-03
First meeting of France's Muslim assembly dominated by debate on headscarves in schools With AP Photos PAR101-104
(APW_ENG_20030503.0213)
1) The issue of whether girls should be allowed to wear Islamic headscarves in French public schools dominated the opening meeting Saturday of a new assembly to represent Islam's diverse factions and serve as a link to the government.
2) Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin was one of the opening speakers at the assembly, seen as a crucial step in France's effort to address the concerns of one of Europe's largest Muslim communities.
3) Raffarin tried to calm tensions over the question of headscarves in schools _ a years-long debate that has gained momentum. In the southeastern city of Lyon, some teachers have pressed school officials to take action against a Muslim student who has worn a bandanna to school to cover her hair in the Islamic tradition.
4) Without expressing a personal opinion, Raffarin said there should be a national discussion.
5) ``The headscarf is a symbol for those who wear it,'' Raffarin told the assembly. ``It is also a symbol for those who contest it.''
6) The conflict is the latest episode in the often heated debate over how to uphold the secular nature of France's public education system. The question has brought France's long tradition of separation of religion and state into a clash with freedom of expression.
7) Raffarin said he didn't rule out a new law to promote secularism in schools. As one example of ``intolerable'' behavior, he cited the case of students who refuse to listen during classes on the Koran if the teacher is a woman or a non-Muslim.
8) Islam is the second largest religion in France, after Roman Catholicism. About five million people in France are Muslim out of a population of 60 million.
9) Until now, France's Muslims have been led by diverse squabbling groups, associations and federations backed variously by Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia _ former French colonies.
10) French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy is working closely with the new assembly, designed in part to thwart the growth of Islamic fundamentalism and help the government keep a link open to Muslim leaders.
11) Thousands of Muslims around France practice their faith in makeshift underground prayer rooms simply because there aren't enough mosques. The government is trying to bring Islam above ground.
12) ``We're turning our back on the Islam of basements and garages,'' Sarkozy said.
13) Until now, unlike France's Jews or Catholics, Muslims have had no unified structure to represent them. Previous efforts to form such a body have failed because of internal differences.
14) On Saturday, the 200 delegates at the meeting adopted statues and nailed down leadership questions.
15) Under an agreement reached by Muslim leaders in December, the council will initially be presided by the head of the Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur _ despite a weak performance in April elections.
16) A fundamentalist Muslim party made an unexpectedly strong showing in the vote. The Union of Islamic Organizations of France _ inspired by Egypt's banned fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood _ took 19 seats in a 60-member council within the assembly.
17) Another slightly less conservative party close to Morocco won 20 seats, while the moderate, Algerian-backed Mosque of Paris, which had been considered a favorite, won just 15 seats.
18) (parf-ad)
2003-05-04
French Muslim representatives name head of Paris mosque to lead them
(APW_ENG_20030504.0327)
1) Muslim leaders on Sunday named the director of the Mosque of Paris to lead a new committee representing Islam's diverse factions in France.
2) Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Mosque of Paris, had been expected to win the post based on a December agreement by Muslim leaders. After a vote, the 60-member body officially confirmed his post and those of 16 others who will serve on a leadership committee.
3) The group is designed to help the French government keep a link open to Muslim leaders, and to thwart the growth of Islamic fundamentalism.
4) Islam is the second largest religion in France, after Roman Catholicism. About five million people in France are Muslim out of a population of 60 million.
5) Until now, France's Muslims have been led by diverse squabbling groups, associations and federations backed variously by Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia _ former French colonies.
6) Boubakeur faced a setback when Muslim leaders held an election for the committee in April and he had a weak performance, winning fewer seats than two other parties.
7) A fundamentalist Muslim party made an unexpectedly strong showing in the April vote. The Union of Islamic Organizations of France is inspired by Egypt's banned fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood.
8) A slightly less conservative party close to Morocco also won more seats than Boubakeur's moderate, Algerian-backed Mosque of Paris, which had been considered the favorite.
9) After discussion, the leaders agreed to honor the earlier agreement on Boubakeur's leadership.
10) The committee met for the first time this weekend. Until now, unlike France's Jews or Catholics, Muslims have had no unified structure to represent them. Previous efforts to form such a body have failed because of internal differences.
11) (parf-ad)
2003-09-02
France's first private Muslim high school opens With AP Photos
(APW_ENG_20030902.0426)
1) Millions of students across France go back to school this week, but for a dozen young Muslims in this gritty northern city, the first day of class took place Tuesday at a mosque _ France's first-ever Muslim private high school.
2) Enrollment was small but school officials said they expected big things from the 10th graders at the Averroes Lycee _ an experiment aimed at reconciling the nation's deep commitment to secularism with the demands of its second-largest religious group.
3) ``The number of students is not significant, but the Averroes Lycee is a symbol,'' said the school's deputy director, Makhlouf Mameche. ``I think this high school will serve as a laboratory. Everyone is waiting for the results.''
4) The high school, located on the third floor of an immaculate mosque in Lille, follows France's national education program. But the curriculum also includes courses in Islamic culture and Arabic language and puts an emphasis on creating a Muslim atmosphere, officials said.
5) Female students, from 14 to 16 years old, said they chose to attend the Averroes Lycee simply to be able to wear their traditional Muslim headscarves.
6) ``It's part of my personality,'' said 16-year-old Samira of the violet scarf wrapped closely to her forehead. She, like all the other girls, refused to give her full name. ``That I can keep my own personality ... is a big benefit,'' she said. ``At the other (public) school, I took my scarf off at the door.''
7) Even the school's principal, Sylvie Taleb, a former French teacher in a Catholic school, wore an elegant white chiffon scarf dotted with small pearls on opening day.
8) ``Perhaps you are writing a new page in the history of France without being aware,'' she told the students. ``You are our ambassadors.''
9) The Muslim headscarf has roiled the French Republic on and off for some 15 years, triggering teachers' strikes, feeding rancor and casting suspicion of Muslim militancy on some women who cover their heads.
10) France, taking in immigrants from its former North African colonies, has the largest Muslim community in Western Europe, estimated at 5 million, and Islam is the nation's second religion, after Roman Catholicism. There are hundreds of private Catholic schools, but the first Muslim school, a junior high school in Aubervilliers, outside Paris, was created only two years ago.
11) The headscarf debate was infused with new passion last spring when Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy reminded a Muslim gathering that women must have their heads uncovered in national identity photos. Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin warned that a law could be passed ``if necessary'' to impose secularism, a mainstay of modern-day France.
12) The debate is so furious that President Jacques Chirac has formed a commission to examine the problem, with a report due at the end of the year.
13) The wearing of religious symbols has been charged with emotion since the 19th century, when advocates of a secular school system free from the influence of the Roman Catholic Church won a bitter fight, clinched by the 1905 law separating church and state.
14) There is now a fear that the headscarf issue could endanger the status quo _ along with concerns of an increasingly assertive Muslim community.
15) The high school, said to be funded only by donations, is located on the third floor of the Al-Imane Mosque. The students have been given three classrooms and a science laboratory _ and use of the cavernous prayer room downstairs.
16) The mosque is owned by the Islamic League of the Nord region, a member of a weighty fundamentalist group, the Union of Islamic Organizations of France, or UOIF.
17) Mosque Rector Amar Lasfar said the new school will inculcate students with ``an Islam that respects the values of the republic.''
18) (eg-ps)
2003-09-17
Interior minister warns that radical Muslim preachers will be expelled
(APW_ENG_20030917.0602)
1) Muslim preachers with radical messages will be expelled from France and their mosques closed, Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy warned in an interview to be published Thursday.
2) ``Because I have held out my hand, I can be very firm about any fundamentalist movement,'' Sarkozy said in an interview with the daily Le Figaro. A text of the interview was provided Wednesday night.
3) The minister said that ``mosques where (radical) Islam is preached will be closed. Imams (Muslim preachers) who give radical sermons will be expelled.''
4) He made the comments in response to questions about the recently created French Council of the Muslim Cult, a body representing various Muslim groups in France.
5) It is presided over by the rector of the Mosque of Paris, Dalil Boubakeur, an Algerian considered a moderate. However, one of the strongest voices in the council is the powerful Union of Islamic Organizations of France, or UOIF, widely seen as a fundamentalist group with ties to Egypt's militant Muslim Brotherhood.
6) Sarkozy held lengthy talks with the UOIF to get the Council on its feet.
7) ``I don't negotiate with radicals. I dialogue with the Muslim community of France in its diversity and its reality,'' Sarkozy was quoted as saying.
8) Successive governments have tried to set up a body bringing together often bickering Muslim groups with the aim of having a spokesman for the Muslim religion.
9) Creating an ``Islam of France'' with French roots has been a long-sought goal here, in part to keep radical brands of Islam from developing.
10) Islam is the second largest religion in France after Roman Catholicism.
11) (parf-eg)
2003-10-17
French prime minister warns against fear of Islam in visit to Paris mosque
(APW_ENG_20031017.0330)
1) Visiting Paris' biggest mosque on Friday, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin cautioned about rising public fear of Islam and vowed to fight any religious hatred in France.
2) ``I'm worried about a certain Islamophobia that is developing in our country,'' Raffarin said during a visit to the Grand Mosque of Paris.
3) Raffarin's visit, the first by a serving prime minister since the mosque was founded in 1922, came as France is grappling with an intensified debate over how Islam fits into secular French society.
4) In his remarks, Raffarin warned of the threat of religious intolerance and said his government would vigorously fight it.
5) ``We are also facing up to anti-Semitism ... We will be intransigeant against any people who would like to propagate and use these fears and hatreds,'' he said.
6) The government has been working to tie Europe's largest Muslim community _ 5 million strong and growing _ into the national fabric. A a government-backed Islamic assembly, uniting diverse factions, was set up this year.
7) France is also facing a debate over whether Muslim women and girls should be permitted to wear head scarves in schools and other public buildings, where some _ including government officials _ say the practice could violate France's prized division of church and state.
8) The debate revived earlier this month when two sisters at a suburban Paris high school were expelled for refusing to take off their scarves.
9) ``French society is being forced to deal with issues related to the head scarf on a daily basis,'' Raffarin said, emphasizing however that ``Islam entirely has its place in France.''
10) The issue has tested a near century-old law that drew distinct lines between religion and state. Many in France are concerned that hard-won secular underpinnings may be under threat.
11) In July, President Jacques Chirac set up a 20-member panel to draw up proposals by the year-end that could satisfy an increasingly diverse France without compromising its secular ethic.
12) Raffarin said a law banning scarves in schools or government offices was only a ``last resort'' for the government.
13) Dalil Boubakeur, the mosque's rector, insisted that ``Islam and secularism are in no way contradictory ... We only hope put harmony between the law and our faith.''
14) Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who joined Raffarin at the mosque Friday, is working closely with the new Islamic assembly. It was designed in part to curb the growth of Islamic fundamentalism and help the government keep a link open to Muslim leaders.
15) In his address, Raffarin also warned against terrorism that has emerged out of fundamentalist Islamic movements.
16) ``Terrorism that purports to find its justification in Islam is still growing while conflicts in which religion plays a central role endure,'' he said.
17) (parf-jk-jc)
2003-11-07
Lack of high-ranking Muslims in France to change
(APW_ENG_20031107.0562)
1) France's interior minister lamented Friday that there were no high-ranking Muslim civil servants in the country _ and he vowed to change that.
2) The comments by Nicolas Sarkozy came at a time when the center-right government is working to tie France's 5-million strong community into the national fabric.
3) Sarkozy, who spearheaded the creation of a broad, government-backed Islamic council this year, said he ``regretted that there were no Muslim compatriots in the high ranks of the civil service.''
4) ``I'm going to name some soon at the highest level,'' he said during a visit to central France.
5) The country is home to western Europe's largest Muslim community, but France's first-ever Muslim private school just opened this year.
6) The country is facing a renewed debate about whether Muslim women and girls should be permitted to wear head scarves in schools and other public buildings. But some say the practice violates France's prized division of church and state.
7) With many politicians and teachers in favor of a law banning Islamic head scarves in public places, President Jacques Chirac set up a commission in July to study the future of secularism in France.
8) Chirac's office has said the president will not say where he stands on a possible law until the commission issues its report, expected before the end of the year.
9) Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, speaking to regional union leaders in suburban Paris, cautioned against seeing a new law as the only answer for the debate over Islamic head scarves.
10) ``Some people say 'we create a law, and we're done with the subject,''' he said. ``A law doesn't necessarily solve the problem.''
11) (parf-jg-jk)
2003-12-11
French experts favor law banning head scarves from schools
(APW_ENG_20031211.0592)
1) A presidential panel concluded Thursday that France should outlaw Islamic head scarves in public schools to halt the burgeoning influence of Muslim fundamentalism and save the values that guide modern-day France.
2) The conclusions of the panel are at the heart of a wrenching debate in France as to how to integrate its Muslim population, the largest in Western Europe.
3) The measure _ after six months of study and 120 hearings that collected testimony from experts across Europe _ would apply mainly to schools and would bar other conspicuous religious symbols, such as Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses.
4) French President Jacques Chirac will announce Wednesday whether he supports putting into law the panel's report, aimed at protecting France's cherished secularism.
5) For nearly 15 years, France has debated whether a law should be promulgated to ban head scarves in public schools. The topic took on new life this year after several girls were expelled from school for refusing to remove head scarves. Dozens were expelled last year.
6) Bernard Stasi, who headed the commission, said the proposed law was aimed at keeping France's strict secular underpinnings intact and at countering ``forces that are trying to destabilize the country,'' a reference to Islamic fundamentalists.
7) Stasi stressed that the commission's work did not target France's Muslim community but was aimed at giving all religions a more equal footing.
8) The panel recommends that ``obvious'' political and religious symbols like Islamic head scarves, Jewish yarmulkes and large Christian crucifixes be banned from the classroom. Discrete symbols like small crosses would be acceptable, it said.
9) France covets its secularism _ won nearly a century ago after a long battle with the Roman Catholic Church _ and fears that this constitutionally guaranteed principle is being undermined by communities who refuse to adhere to the French mold.
10) More alarming, perhaps, is French authorities' fear that head scarves and other religious symbols are a sign that a militant Islam is gaining ground.
11) One panel member, researcher Jacqueline Costa-Lascoux, cited in an interview the case of a Moroccan girl whose father was paid EUR 500 (US$600) a trimester to ensure that his daughter wore a head scarf to school.
12) Muslims represent up some 7 percent of France's 60 million people _ _ the largest in Western Europe. France's Jewish community, about 1 percent of the population, is also Western Europe's largest.
13) There is currently no law banning headscarves in French schools. The Council of State, France's highest administrative body, has said scarves should be banned only when of an ``ostentatious character'' but left it up to schools to make that judgment.
14) Head scarves are already forbidden for people working in the public sector, but that rule _ which is not a law _ is occasionally broken. A Muslim employee of the city of Paris was recently suspended for refusing to take off her scarf or shake men's hands.
15) The Muslim head scarf is but one aspect of the problem, according to the panel. Without naming a particular religion, the report cited examples of male students refusing to take oral exams from female teachers.
16) Hospitals and other public institutions are not spared. According to the report, some hospital corridors are used as prayer rooms and some men refuse to allow their wives to be treated by male doctors.
17) Such behavior is often the work of ``organized groups testing the resistance of the Republic,'' the report said.
18) There has been an alarming rise in anti-Semitism, the report notes and teaching the Holocaust ``becomes impossible'' in some classrooms.
19) In a first, the panel proposed adding one Jewish and one Muslim holiday to the school calendar and creating a national institute to study Islam.
20) Religious leaders of all stripes reacted cautiously.
21) The Conference of Bishops of France said it would reserve judgment until Chirac announces his conclusions.
22) The Protestant Federation of France said the report ``seems acceptable'' because the scope of the report enables ``the principles of secularism in 21st century France to be clarified.''
23) In a letter earlier this week to Chirac, the Roman Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox churches said the nation needs to focus on better integrating Muslims into French society, and an anti-head scarf law would not achieve that goal.
24) Moise Cohen, president of the Consistoire of Paris, which directs religious Jewish life, said Thursday he opposes a head scarf law because it could be viewed by Muslims as discriminatory and ``exacerbate emotions.''
25) The French Council for the Muslim Faith, an umbrella group representing France's Muslims, appeared to reject the commission's report, although in mild terms. The council said it agreed with the positions of the Jewish and Christian religious leaders opposing the ban.
26) Chirac has already made clear his opposition to head scarves in the classroom. On a state visit last week to Tunisia, Chirac told a group of high school students that wearing a veil in France was seen as ``a sort of aggression.''
27) The headscarf issue has triggered debate elsewhere in Europe as Muslims immigrate there.
28) Germany's 16 states are split over whether to introduce headscarf bans. Some of them argue it's not necessary, but Bavaria and Baden-Wuerttemberg this year introduced legislation that would prohibit the wearing of headscarves in schools.
29) In 1999, thousands of Muslims in Turin, Italy marched to demand that women be allowed to wear veils in photos for official identity documents. While such headscarves aren't banned, a woman's face must be visible in official photos.
30) In October, a Muslim activist in Roman Catholic Italy won a court ruling to have a crucifix removed from his son's elementary school. The ruling was subsequently overturned.
31) Predominantly Muslim Turkey is officially secular, and strict laws ban women from wearing headscarves in government offices and schools. In faraway Singapore, where 15 percent of the population is Muslim, bans headscarves in schools although many women wear them in public.
32) (eg-ps)
2004-01-18
French Muslim official calls on moderate Muslims to oppose fundamentalism
(APW_ENG_20040118.0222)
1) A top Muslim official urged the community's ``silent majority'' to oppose Islamic extremism, saying in an interview published Sunday that weekend protests against France's plan to ban head scarves from schools only drew the nation's radicalized minority.
2) Dalil Boubakeur, head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, said Saturday's march in Paris that drew at least 10,000 people was ``a protest of anger, which is not representative at all of Islam in France.'' Smaller protests were held around the world.
3) At the Paris march, ``what we saw was only 0.6 percent of Muslims in France, no more,'' Boubakeur told Sunday's Le Parisien newspaper.
4) ``The big unknown now is how to organize the silent majority _ France's 4 to 5 million moderate Muslims ... who want an open Islam that respects secular values,'' said Boubakeur, also the rector of the Mosque of Paris.
5) Boubakeur, an Algerian who is considered a moderate and a government ally, called on France's liberal Muslims to ``step from the shadows'' and make their views known.
6) The Paris march had reverberations around the world, with Muslims holding protests from London to Los Angeles and Baghdad to Beirut. It was the largest coordinated demonstration against the planned French law, which would ban ``conspicuous'' religious signs from public schools, including Islamic head scarves, Jewish skull caps and large Christian crosses.
7) President Jacques Chirac says the goal is to protect France's secular underpinnings. However, it also is seen as a way to hold back the swell of Islamic fundamentalism in France's Muslim community _ the largest in Western Europe.
8) Malek Boutih, an Algerian-born intellectual and the former president of French anti-racism group SOS Racisme, said most French Muslims ``refused to participate'' in Saturday's protest.
9) ``Now, we have to listen to the voice of Muslims ... who support secularism,'' Boutih told Radio-J, a Jewish radio station. ``I believe that it's the vast majority of those living in France.''
10) The draft law is expected to go before French lawmakers next month. Easy passage is expected, and the law would become applicable with the new school year in September.
11) Bernard Stasi, who headed the presidential panel that recommended the law be passed, urged Muslims not see the ban as discriminatory.
12) ``Let's not fall into this trap of saying that France doesn't want Islam,'' Stasi told France-Inter radio. ``France is opening its arms to Islam.''
13) He added: ``If Muslims play the game of secularism'' in France, ``they will be more free in our country than they would in the majority of Islamic countries.''
14) Asked about the Saturday march, Stasi said he questioned whether the protesters _ mostly veiled women _ attended on their own will.
15) ``If, as one imagines, the majority of them were forced to protest, I feel sorry for them,'' he said.
16) Saturday's protest was organized by the Party of Muslims of France, a small group known for its radical views. The huge Union of Islamic Organizations of France, a fundamentalist group, gave its blessing and encouraged people to take part.
17) (parf-jg-ps)
2004-02-04
Lawmakers debate whether to ban Islamic head scarves in French schools as Muslims protest outside
(APW_ENG_20040204.0042)
1) Muslims opposed to legislation that would ban Islamic head scarves in public schools held a protest outside France's parliament Wednesday, the second day of a debate that was likely to culminate in the measure's passage next week.
2) A record number of lawmakers _ 144 _ have signed up to speak before the National Assembly on what is known here as the ``law on secularism'' _ a measure seen by supporters as key to maintaining France's cherished separation of church and state.
3) Opponents _ especially certain Muslim groups _ say the measure fails to address the real issue: the failure to integrate France's large Muslim population into the mainstream. Some contended such a law bears real risks to society, such as fueling extremism and forcing Muslim girls to leave school rather than take off their head coverings.
4) Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, opening the parliamentary debate Tuesday, made a forceful plea in favor of a ban on ``conspicuous'' religious symbols and apparel in public schools. The legislation also would ban Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses.
5) Education Minister Luc Ferry said in an interview published Wednesday in the daily Le Parisien that he does not fear a backlash if the legislation is enacted in time for the 2004 school year, as expected.
6) ``The law will clarify things and be applied without difficulty,'' Ferry predicted.
7) Muslim militants quickly mounted a protest in front of the National Assembly as Ferry, followed by former Prime Minister Alain Juppe, addressed the chamber.
8) Up to 10,000 Muslims marched through Paris, and in capitals around the world, Jan. 17. Another street protest was set for Saturday.
9) The Union of Islamic Organizations of France, or UOIF, a large fundamentalist grouping, has asked legislators to amend the bill to allow Muslim school girls to wear something ``discrete'' on their heads.
10) The law ``will be perceived by many as a regression of liberties that will only feed feelings of frustration and rejection,'' said a statement by the UOIF carried on its Internet site.
11) A ban is seen as a means of guaranteeing respect for the constitutionally guaranteed principle of secularism that underpins French society. However, Raffarin made clear that it is also a tool to try to halt a rise in Muslim fundamentalism.
12) With an estimated 5 million Muslims, France has the largest such population in Western Europe and Islam is the second religion in this mainly Roman Catholic country.
13) ``Certain religious signs, and among them the Islamic head scarf, are multiplying in our schools,'' Raffarin said Tuesday, opening the debate. ``They take on a political meaning and cannot be considered as signs of personal religious adherence.
14) He told lawmakers that the larger issue _ integration _ would be addressed in other ways.
15) Raffarin added there would be a plan drawn up regarding hospitals, where problems have arisen because female patients have been refusing treatment by male health care workers for religious reasons.
16) A vote on the bill is expected Feb. 10. Despite dissension, the large government majority all but guaranteed passage.
17) (eg-ps)
2004-03-03
2004-03-04
Senate vote assures ban on Islamic head scarves in public schools in September
(APW_ENG_20040304.0051)
1) With an overwhelming vote, France's Senate has assured that a law banning Islamic head scarves from public schools will be on the books for the new school year in September despite protests at home and abroad.
2) Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin expressed official concern for the first time Wednesday over possible negative fallout over the law, telling senators that France must ``try to reassure'' detractors who consider it discriminatory.
3) However, massive approval hours later by the Senate, which voted 276-20 in favor of the legislation, provides the legitimacy President Jacques Chirac sought.
4) The vote came three weeks after the National Assembly, the lower chamber, overwhelmingly approved the bill in a 494-36 vote following a marathon debate.
5) Only a formality remains _ the president's signing the measure into law within the next 15 days. Chirac has said a law is needed to protect the constitutionally guaranteed principle of secularism, and to stop the spread of Muslim fundamentalism in France.
6) The law forbids religious apparel and signs that ``conspicuously show'' a student's religious affiliation. Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses would also be banned. However, authorities have made clear that it is aimed at removing Islamic head scarves from classrooms.
7) French leaders hope the law will quell debate over head scarves that has divided France since 1989, when two young girls were expelled from their school in Creil, outside Paris, for wearing the head coverings. Scores more have since been expelled.
8) However, there are fears that the law could do more harm that good. France's Roman Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox churches are among those who have expressed that view.
9) The head scarf ban in public schools has drawn outrage from Muslims in France and abroad.
10) In the latest protests, some 6,000 students in Cairo demonstrated Monday at the Islamic Al-Azhar University, where the head scarf is compulsory for women. A day earlier, more than 2,000 Muslims, mainly veiled women, protested in Amman, Jordan.
11) An audiotape with a voice attributed to the top lieutenant of Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri, aired Feb. 24 on the Arabic TV station Al-Arabiya, said the French measure ``is another example of the Crusader's malice, which Westerns have against Muslims.''
12) ``It is clear that on the international level the question is not always understood,'' Raffarin said.
13) The measure ``could be perceived as sectarian,'' he added. ``We must not consider this to be a minor situation.''
14) Raffarin insisted, however, that the law was needed to ensure respect for secularism and contain the spread of Muslim fundamentalism.
15) ``We wanted to send a strong and rapid signal,'' the prime minister said.
16) Mostly Roman Catholic France has an estimated 5 million Muslims _ the largest Muslim population in Western Europe. French leaders have said that fundamentalism is on the rise within the Muslim population.
17) The legislation stipulates that ``in schools, junior high schools and high schools, signs and dress that conspicuously show the religious affiliation of students are forbidden.'' It does not apply to students in private schools.
18) Sanctions for refusing to remove offending apparel will range from a warning to temporary suspension to expulsion.
19) How the law will be applied remains unclear. Instructions are to be distributed to schools around the nation. However, no one is yet certain whether Muslim girls wishing to cover their hair will be allowed to wear smaller apparel like bandannas _ or whether Sikh boys will permitted to keep their turbans.
20) Education Minister Luc Ferry is to meet with representatives of France's tiny Sikh population _ estimated at some 4,000 _ on March 10.
21) France's largest Muslim fundamentalist organization, the Union of Islamic Organizations of France, has said it is already telling young girls to wear bandannas. _ _ _ _
22) Associated Press writer Nathalie Schuck contributed to this report.
2004-04-05
French prime minister admits errors but presses on with reforms
(APW_ENG_20040405.0420)
1) The French prime minister was unequivocal. ``There have been mistakes, there have been delays. They will be corrected,'' he told parliament Monday.
2) But Jean-Pierre Raffarin, in his first major policy address since an election hammering, also said his government will forge ahead with contested economic reforms.
3) His speech, which was followed by debate and a vote of confidence that Raffarin's reshuffled government easily won, marked his response to a beating in March 28 regional elections. Voters used the polls to show their anger with unemployment running at nearly 10 percent and reforms to pensions and other pillars of France's treasured social protections.
4) But Raffarin said reforms will continue. A proposed law on one of the most contested changes _ to the indebted health insurance system _ will be debated by parliament as planned this summer, he said.
5) ``Immobility is the adversary. It is that which hurts France,'' he said. The government heard voters' ``worries and their impatience. But they did not choose abandonment, they did not choose retreat,'' he insisted.
6) ``I'm sticking to the course of reform, of fair reform,'' he said.
7) While the elections were regional, the scale of the defeat for the right was such that it prompted conservative President Jacques Chirac to rejigger the government. At the polls, the first electoral test for Chirac since he and his party swept presidential and legislative elections in 2002, the Socialist-led opposition took control of 20 of mainland France's 22 regional councils.
8) But Chirac kept Raffarin _ despite grumbling from the opposition left, which wanted wholesale change in government policy. Some believe Chirac may only keep Raffarin until the health insurance reforms are implemented and the hurdle of European Parliament elections is passed in June.
9) In the parliamentary debate that followed Raffarin's 35-minute speech, opposition politicians described the prime minister as fatally weakened, living on borrowed time.
10) ``We ask ourselves here about your authority,'' Socialist leader Francois Hollande said. At the polls, ``a majority of our citizens clearly penalized your policies. They did so massively.''
11) Added Noel Mamere of the Greens: ``We have the feeling that we're facing a virtual prime minister.''
12) But Raffarin's reshaped government, backed by its center-right majority in the 577-seat National Assembly, easily carried the vote of confidence by 379 to 178.
13) In his speech, Raffarin promised redoubled efforts to combat unemployment and said the government would work to cut red tape to help businesses create jobs. He said the government will speed up a program of privatizing state-owned companies, part of a broader effort to make France more attractive to investment.
14) ``The concern of the French is employment and employment is the first priority of the government,'' he said.
15) Raffarin said economic recovery will allow France to rein in its budget deficit to within European Union limits _ although he did not say when. France has previously promised to bring the deficit back to within the limit of 3 percent of gross domestic product by 2005.
16) ``Everything must be done for growth and competitiveness,'' Raffarin said. ``The conditions for the return of growth have been created, and unemployment is starting to retreat.''
17) But growth is returning more slowly than hoped. The official statistics institute Insee said last week that growth was set to reach an annual rate of 1.4 percent by July, instead of 1.7 percent predicted last December, in part because of the weak U.S. dollar.
18) And the respected newspaper Le Monde, citing leaked government data, reported Monday that France expects its public deficit to reach 4.1 percent of GDP this year and 4 percent in 2005.
19) The government's official deficit forecast is 3.6 percent for this year and 2.9 percent in 2005.
20) The health insurance system, meanwhile, is projected to post a record deficit of EUR 10.9 billion (US$13 billion) this year. Raffarin said the system is ``gravely threatened'' and called on parliament to rally together to reform it.
21) ``Health can't be financed on credit,'' he said.
22) (jl-ps)
2005-05-12
2005-05-31
2005-06-19
2005-06-26
Head of Paris mosque re-elected president of France's Muslim Council
(APW_ENG_20050626.0565)
1) The head of the Paris mosque, Dalil Boubakeur, was re-elected Sunday for another two-year term as president of France's Muslim council, ending a tense week among the country's diverse and often bickering Muslim groups.
2) Fouad Allaoui, secretary general of a powerful Muslim fundamentalist organization who had threatened to walk out of the vote, was elected as one of two vice presidents, along with Abdellah Boussouf of the National Federation of Muslims of France, close to Morocco.
3) Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy persuaded Allaoui's Union of Islamic Organization's of France, or UOIF, to take part in the vote of the board to run the council, according to Sliman Nadour, an aide to Boubakeur.
4) President Jacques Chirac, in a phone call to Boubakeur, praised the council, often fraught with power struggles, for its "spirit of dialogue."
5) "It is a good image for Muslim believers and a good image for the national community which need not worry," the interior minister said after the vote.
6) The Council of the Muslim Faith was set up two years ago by Sarkozy after years of failed efforts to give the government a channel to France's diverse Muslim community and organize an Islam of France.
7) Islam is this nation's second largest religion after Roman Catholicism, and French authorities, fearful of rising Muslim fundamentalism, are working to ensure that the Islam practiced here is moderate and takes into account its "French" roots.
8) Muslim groups here have long been under the domination of the countries from which they hail and mosques are often funded by other countries. Boubakeur's Grand Mosque of Paris, for instance, is under the tutelage of Algeria.
9) Boubakeur, known for his moderation, served as president of the council in its first two years.
10) The vote for the council's executive board came a week after elections to name the 43-member council, with some 5,230 imams and other Muslims at France's 1,200 mosques taking part.
11) Allaoui's UOIF lost three seats in those elections, ending up with 10 seats, like Boubakeur's Paris mosque, while the Moroccan federation won the election with 19 seats.
12) Hours before the vote in a hotel in Bagnolet, on the northeast edge of Paris, police detained a man armed with what turned out to be a fake pistol, standing near Sarkozy, aides to the minister said. The man, a resident of Bagnolet, was taken to the local police station.
2006-09-28
French interior minister visits Paris ' main mosque
(APW_ENG_20060928.1757)
1) French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy met with Muslim leaders Thursday at Paris' main mosque for iftar, the dinner with which Muslims break their daylight fasting during the Ramadan holy month.
2) Sarkozy said the dinner was a "symbol of the peaceful relations between the Republic and the Muslims of our country."
3) Law-and-order minister Sarkozy, a presidential hopeful in spring elections, ate with Dalil Boubakeur, the director of the mosque, and other leaders of an umbrella group of French Muslims that serves as a link to the government.
4) Sarkozy and other French leaders have sought to promote an "Islam of France" compatible with French values and Muslim beliefs. With an estimated 5 million adherents -- almost a tenth of the population -- Islam is France's second largest religion.
5) In 2004, looking to uphold its secular foundations and discourage Islamic fundamentalism, France banned Muslim head scarves and other conspicuous religious symbols from public schools. During the mosque visit, Sarkozy pledged to keep up the French push for secularism in its institutions.
6) "My visit here is not one of protocol," he said. "It is the visit of a friend."