ITALY—On Friday, November 11, a Muslim woman was fined in Italy 30,000 euros for refusing to remove her niqab, a full face veil with an opening to make the eyes visible, in a public place.
In October, the 40-year-old woman was attending a youth meeting at a town hall in Pordenone, a town in northeast Italy. She was asked by the town mayor, Antonio Di Bisceglie, to remove her niqab for identification purposes. After she repeatedly refused, the mayor called the police and she was removed from the meeting. The woman is a citizen of Italy and has lived in the neighboring town of San Vito al Tagliamento for 16 years. Her son was participating at the event.
According to RT.com, when the case was brought to court, a local prosecutor, Federico Facchin, charged the woman with concealing her identity and sentenced her to four months in jail and a fine of 600 euros ($650).
The fine was changed to 30,000 euros after a higher judicial court reviewed the case and found the woman guilty of violating law 152 of 1975 which “features an obligation for it to be possible to recognize someone’s face for security reasons,” stated ANSAit.com.
