UK -Politics & World Current Affairs

Monday 16 October 2006 

The Leader of the Commons and former Foreign Secretary  Jack Straw dropped a bomb shell a few days ago by writing a column in his constituency local paper saying he asked veiled Muslim women to consider removing the Niqab (full veil)  when visiting him in his surgery. The surprise was that many of them obliged, but the attack on him, from self-styled Muslim leaders and from British left came as no surprise.

By  Adel Darwish.

The heat of the ongoing debate about the Muslim full-veil Niqab  in Britain today mustn’t let us overlook some constitutional, democratic and cultural aspects which the controversy touches.  The debate, or rather the uproar among Muslims, and sections of the British left, began when the leader of the   Commons Jack Straw revealed that during his meetings with his female Muslim constituents in his weekly surgery in Blackburn, North West England, he asked them politely (not demanded) to consider the niqab from a broader perspective; and to think whether it was a barrier to their fully communicating with their, male and female, fellow citizens?

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This blog is edited by Adel Darwish. A Veteran Fleet Street reporter, and Middle East Specialist