France’s women’s rights minister Laurence Rossignol has sparked outrage with her recent statement that compared hijab-wearing Muslim women to “negroes who accepted slavery”, reports the BBC.
In a TV interview on Wednesday, Rossignol was criticising fashion brands like H&M, Marks & Spencer and Dolce & Gabbana for marketing hijabs, saying that they were “promoting the confinement of women’s bodies,” France 24 reported.
When her interviewer noted that some Muslim women choose to wear the hijab, she responded, “Of course there are women who choose it. There were American negroes who were in favor of slavery.”
Since then, there have been calls for her resignation, with a Change.org petition that has amassed over 26,000 signatures and the #RossignolDemission hashtag trending on Twitter.