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Source: Reuters
The Australian creator of the "burqini" says she is not surprised a woman wearing a full-length swimsuit was turned away from a Paris pool, saying the French have a fear of the unknown.
Aheda Zanetti launched the full-length "burqini" in Australia in 2003 to allow Muslim women to swim and compete in sport without having to expose their bodies.
A woman wearing a similar full-length swimsuit was refused entry to a Paris swimming pool on the basis of hygiene regulations, despite reportedly having swum there in July in the same suit.
It came amid government hearings in France into whether to ban the burqa after President Nicolas Sarkozy said the head-to-toe veil was "not welcome" in secular France.
Zanetti, who runs Sydney swimwear company Ahiida, says she is not surprised by the report as she experienced some resistance to launching the "burqini" in the French market.
"France is ... they've got different ways," she says.
"Everyone is trying to protect their country and protect their ways and it's a fear of the unknown. They've got that fear of unknown of full cover."
She says French authorities need to be more open-minded about the burqini.
"If you're not happy with it, find out more about it," Zanetti says.
"Let's talk about it. Let's open the conversation up and discuss. They just want to put it in the `too hard basket' and leave it."
Zanetti says she also had to work hard to have the "burqini" accepted in other European nations such as The Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria and Germany.
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