by Huma Dar
The police, in the northern Italian town of Novara, fined a 26-year-old Tunisian woman for wearing a black niqab; she was going to a mosque for the Friday prayers. According to the New York Times she was fined about $650 under a regulation introduced in January 2010. Apparently, Novara — a bastion of the xenophobic Northern League — “bans clothing in public that prevents identification by the police.”
Police Inspector Leonardo Borghesani says, “We just enforced a local law that stops people from covering their face near sensitive places like schools, hospitals or post offices.” He acknowledges that “the fine is hefty, but she can appeal.”
Here’s a question for the police enforcing the surveillance society in Novara:
Did you also fine all the people at the [Carnival] Carnevale Novara who “covered their faces” in public and “prevented identification”? If not, I am sure there are plenty of Youtube videos, like the one above from 2009, that you might want to scrutinize for harvesting more fines. If not, you are the ones unmasked as disgustingly racist.
P.S: The last time the Carnevale was proscribed was during Mussolini’s Fascist regime!
