United Nation: France was found to have discriminated against with a Muslim woman who was denied access to vocational training at a public school because she was wearing a headscarf.
In 2010, Naima Mezhoud, then 45 years old, was scheduled to complete a course in management assistance at a public high school where teenagers are not permitted to wear the hijab.
Based on the document that was seen, the school principal of the school on the northern fringes of Paris refused to let her in when she arrived.
France had outlawed the wear of hijabs and other overt religious symbols in public schools six years prior, in 2004.Mezhoud stated that because she was a student pursuing a higher education, the legislation shouldn’t have singled her out.
According to the document, the UN Committee on Human Rights concluded that preventing Mezhoud from taking part in the training while donning her headscarf constituted a discriminatory conduct based on both gender and religion.
The document’s validity was confirmed by a UN source.
A comment request was not immediately answered by the interior or foreign ministries.
