On Monday the 6th August, in a column in the Daily Telegraph, Boris Johnson compared fully veiled Muslim women to “letter boxes” and “bank robbers”. Member of Parliament for Bethnal Green and Bow, Rushanara Ali, strongly condemns Johnson’s divisive comments.
Rushanara Ali MP said:
“I am a passionate defender of women’s right to choose what they wear. That includes defending those Muslim women who choose not to wear the hijab, the burka, the niqab, as well as those who choose to do so.
I utterly condemn Boris Johnson’s reprehensible comments. They are an indefensible and dangerous attempt to stir up hatred towards Muslims at a time when Islamophobic hate crime has risen by 26% nationally and 40% in London in the last year. Boris Johnson is a self-serving politician who will stop at nothing to advance his political ambitions even if it means stoking up hatred towards Muslim women. As Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson was often a national embarrassment and he continues in that vein, by pandering to the far right instead of standing up for British values such as the protection of minority rights, including freedom of religious expression.”