Veil

France is experiencing a  'venomous national debate' that is scrambling questions over the headscarf, Islam, immigration and radicalization.

Laurence Rossignol sparked a row after she appeared on French TV and criticised fashion brands that market hijabs as 'irresponsible'.

Christian Leclerc, the mayor of Champlan near Paris who provoked a media storm last weekend when he refused to allow a Roma baby to be buried in his town, has form when it comes to antipathy towards the community. Since the controversy Leclerc has sought to portray himself as a victim of the media and political opponents and claims he has been misrepresented. But Mediapart has got hold of a recording of a recent council meeting in which the mayor denigrated the Roma people in his area. He also wrote a letter to local residents in which he fuelled their fears over a suspected case of tuberculosis. Carine Fouteau and Ellen Salvi report.

Nadine Morano posted picture of a veiled holidaymaker on her Facebook account describing the scene as 'an attack on our culture'.

A 24-year-old French woman had claimed the 2010 ban on wearing the veil in public violated her freedom of religion and expression.

Cassandra Belin fined for 'wearing clothing that hides the face' and given suspended jail term for threatening police in arrest that led to riots.

A ban on Muslim headscarves for volunteer school monitors is maintained, despite a warning by the Council of State that it oversteps the law.

Lawyers for woman who was arrested in July for wearing the veil are arguing that the 2011 legal ban is discriminatory and unconstitutional.

Arguing that the niqab is part of her "religious faith, culture and personal convictions" she calls for France's full-face veil ban to be overturned.

The 16-year-old, reportedly assaulted by skinheads for wearing a veil, jumped from the fourth floor of a building and was 'seriously injured'.

There was an outcry in France when an appeal court sided with a woman who was fired by a private crèche for wearing a headscarf at work. Interior minister Manuel Valls says he now favours a new law to extend the ban on wearing religious symbols, while opponents argue that new measures simply risk stigmatising French Muslims still further. As Carine Fouteau reports, it looks as if the government has come on the side of the interior minister and is preparing new legislation.

Country’s top court rules in favour of woman fired by a private nursery school five years ago for refusing to remove her Islamic veil at work.

The man vainly tried to justify the attack as an attempt to uphold a controversial law banning women from wearing face-covering veils in public.

Three Saudi women who refused to remove their face veils at Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport were barred entry to France, a police union claims.

Muslims in France and elsewhere in Europe face discrimination in education, employment and religious freedom, says Amnesty International report.