Rushdie says Muslim face veils ‘suck’

AUTHOR Salman Rushdie has risked further Muslim wrath after saying that face veils for women “suck”.

The British writer — who was once the subject of a fatwa by Ayatollah Khomeni of Iran over his novel The Satanic Verses — said he regarded the veil as a way of taking power away from women.

He backed leader of the Commons Jack Straw, who provoked a furious response from sections of the Muslim community last week when he urged Muslim women to abandon the veil, describing it as a “visible statement of separation” which impeded good community relations.

“He was expressing an important opinion which is that veils suck — which they do,” Mr Rushdie told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

“Speaking as somebody with three sisters and a very largely female Muslim family, there is not a single woman I know in my family or in their friends who would have accepted the wearing of a veil.

“The battle against the veil has been a long and continuing battle against the limitation of women, so in that sense, I am completely on his side.”

Mr Straw’s comment has plunged Britain into a debate over Islamic integration. Prime Minister Tony Blair also backed Mr Straw’s decision to raise the issue.

While wearing the veil was a personal choice, the prime minister said, it was “perfectly sensible” to discuss the matter in the context of breaking down barriers between communities.

“What Jack Straw was saying was perfectly sensible, which is that if we want to break down the barriers between people and between different cultures and religions, then it is important these issues are raised and discussed.

“If you raise it in a measured and considered way to have a proper public discussion about it,” he told BBC Breakfast.

Inayat Bunglawala, of The Muslim Council of Britain, said he was not surprised by the author’s comments: “Salman Rushdie’s comments are certainly not a surprise. The same freedom that we have in this country that allowed him to have a book published blaspheming the Prophet is the same freedom which women who choose to wear the niqab are invoking.”