PARIS – Protesting French ban on burkini, some thirty beach-goers in Brittany, northern France, took to the sea fully clothed on Sunday, after a video emerged showing a veil-wearing Muslim woman being asked to undress or leave the beach in Nice.

“These Muslim women are French women, and the anti-burkini rules were persecuting them. It’s intolerable”, one member of the group told a local newspaper, The Local.fr reported on Tuesday, August 30.

The protest was organized by local feminist group “Le Planning familial du Finistere”, who wished to stand up against burkini bans recently imposed in around 30 towns in France.

A recent controversy on burkini has erupted in the wake of the French authorities’ decision to ban the swimsuit in Cannes, Corsica ,Le Touquet, and followed by more other  French mayors.

The decision was criticized by many commentators who see burkini as something that grants so many women access to sports and experiences they would have otherwise avoided because of health, body or religious concerns.

Anger also increased after a series of photos emerged showing four police officers armed with handguns, batons and pepper spray standing around the woman who was lying on the beach wearing a blue headscarf and matching top.

In Sunday’s protests, photos taken at the beach showed both men and women wearing clothes and even head coverings whilst swimming in the sea.

“We wanted to show our solidarity with these women,” Monique Prevost, who organized the protest on the beach, told The Local.

The idea came to Prevost and her friends on Friday evening.

“We were discussing how the burkini is all anyone is talking about these days and how the ban isn’t justified.  We discussed how we could denounce the grotesque side of the situation that has developed,” she added.

“We decided to gather on the beach as a way of showing our solidarity with these women.’

Positive Reaction

The reaction to the beach protest has been overwhelmingly positive.

“Photos of us on the beach have been shared and liked thousands of times. As of yet we have only received one hostile comment in response,” Prevost said.

The protest in support of women choosing to wear the burkini came as another video emerged of a Muslim woman apparently being asked to leave the beach in Nice, southern France, because she was wearing a veil.

The incident occurred on Saturday, a day after France’s highest administrative court overturned the ban on burkinis at a nearby resort.

The ruling was supposed to set a more commendable precedent but local authorities in Nice refused to accept it.

According to Nice Matin newspaper which published the video, the police arrived in a patrol boat and approached the woman from the sea.

She was informed that there was a rule about what she could wear on the beach.

She told the police she was not actually swimming in the sea, but nevertheless left the beach with her and her family.

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