Brussels, 11/03/2010 (Agence Europe) - “I am a Muslim and I suffer from an overly systematic stigmatising against us. I have even heard this today at the Parliament premises” wrote Malika Benarab-Attou, MEP on the Europe Ecology list, but did not provide any further details on this point. In a press release, published on International Women's Day on 8 March, she pointed out that Islam was part of Mediterranean culture and this “goes beyond the Islam as depicted by the powers that be”.
Benarab-Attou returned to the subject of veil and affirmed that “a number of intellectuals consider that this is exclusively a sign of submission from the women who wear it, whereas it has been worn since the beginning of time by many women in the Mediterranean region, north and south and even before the arrival of Islam”. She explained that as a consequence, “we are not going to demonise Islam as a religion or assume that Muslim women who wear it are unquestionably oppressed. What I am today is an MEP at the European Parliament and this demonstrates that we can be Muslim and we can be emancipated women”. She called for “accepting a greater plurality of identities and ways of finding emancipation”, which is the only position humanely desirable and part of our very important European values pertaining to“fraternity”. (F.B./transl.fl)