|
|
Batai (R), one the workers, had
received a thank-you letter from the airport authorities for
discovering a smuggled weapon at the airport.
|
PARIS — French Muslim workers of the Charles de
Gaulle airport have decried their "discriminatory" expulsion
from the airport for no apparent reason other than being Muslims,
while Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy vowed to challenge court
orders to reinstall some of them.
"I was on vacation when I received a message
that my access badge has been withdrawn," Mohamed Ali Louja told
IslamOnline.net on Thursday, November 16.
"At first I thought the decision had to do
with not paying some overdue bills," he added.
When Louja went to the Saint Denis police station
seeking answers for the decision he was faced with a barrage of
irrelevant questions.
"They asked me about my beard, whether my wife
was hijab-clad, whether I have been to Pakistan before and whether I
had any ties with Salafists," he said.
Louja is one of 72 seasonal Muslim workers who were
barred on October 21 from working at the airport after police withdrew
their access badges, which allowed them to work in airport customs
zones.
France's Anti-terrorist Coordination Unit (UCLAT)
said that the Muslim workers posed "a risk to the airport's
security" or were simply deemed "dangerous."
But a number of the workers had challenged the
decision.
Two workers regained their badges on Wednesday,
November 16, after a court ruled that they were wrongly deprived of
their security passes.
Five others who had also asked for their security
clearance to be reinstated had their request denied by the court.
Two workers had earlier got their badges back
through the court.
Sarkozy vowed Thursday to challenge the court
orders return of badges to the Muslim workers.
Thank-you
|
|
"It is extremely dangerous to
withdraw the badges of the workers for no apparent reason other
than being followers of a certain faith," said Aounit.
|
Mohamed Sedeki, who has regained his badge, said
the security had been withdrawn for no apparent reason.
"When I asked for the reason I was told that I
posed a danger to the national security," he said.
"But they declined to reveal the nature of the
threat on claims they were state secrets."
But the Muslim worker managed to seek a number of
documents comprising the charges against him.
"I found out that my name and address were
wrong and that the indictment included things I have never heard
about," he added.
Hervey Batai has been working at the Charles de
Gaulle airport for three years.
"I had no problems during that period,"
he told IOL.
"Rather, I received a thank-you letter from
the security authorities after having discovering a smuggled weapon at
the airport," he recalled.
But things took a sudden U-turn for the Muslim
worker.
"One day I got a message from the Saint Denis
police station that my access badge has been withdrawn," he
remembered.
"They told me that they had suspicions about
my trips to a number of countries including Spain, Pakistan, the US
and Kosovo though I had never been in the Caucasian province
before."
"Most trips were for entertainment with my
family and parents," he asserted.
The Movement Against Racism and for the Friendship
Among Peoples (MRAR) has blasted the discriminatory expulsion of the
Muslim workers.
"It is extremely dangerous to withdraw the
badges of the workers for no apparent reason other than being
followers of a certain faith," said MRAR Secretary General
Mouloud Aounit.
Trade unionists at the Charles de Gaulle-Roissy
airport on Friday, November 3, called for a general strike in protest
at the expulsion of the Muslims workers.
Right-wing politician Philippe de Villiers has
claimed that the airport had been infiltrated by "Islamic
militants".
Villiers -- a presidential hopeful in next year's
elections – was accused of playing on public fears of Islamic
radicals to win votes.
In 2002, a French-Algerian airport baggage handler
was arrested when weapons and explosives were found in his car. Police
later said he had been the victim of a set up.
