UK's far-right party focuses on burqa ban in campaign

By Ahmet Gurhan Kartal

LONDON

The far-right UK Independence Party (UKIP) said it would pursue a ban on burqa in their party manifesto, which is expected to be published on Monday, according to the party leader on Sunday.

Paul Nuttal told BBC One’s Andrew Marr Show the party will also target Sharia rule in Britain as part of their campaign.

"We have a heightened security risk at the moment and for CCTV to be effective you need to see people's faces,” said.

"Secondly, there's the issue of integration. I don't believe you can integrate fully and enjoy the fruits of British society if you can't see people's faces,” he added.

Nuttal said the party’s policies were not singling out Muslims. About the ban on Shaira, he said there were no similar proposals to ban Jewish religious courts because the Jewish population was smaller than the Muslim population.

“Integration is actually getting worse in Britain at the moment, not better. This [burqa ban] will help,” he said.

“This isn’t an attack on specifically on Muslims, it’s all about integration,” he added.

Anti-Turkey

The Eurosceptic UKIP previously put Turkey’s EU membership in the center of their Leave campaign prior to last year’s Brexit referendum.

An ad in the form of a news report featuring scenes from Turkey had claimed the U.K. would have to bear 15 million Muslim refugees if Turkey became an EU member.

Meral Hussein-Ece, a Turkish Cypriot member of the House of Lords, had said the ad broadcast was “blatant racism trying to whip up Islamophobic hate crime”.

“They’re using Turkey to whip up fear. It’s insulting, given what Turkey is doing to help the Syrian refugees and keep them out of Europe,” she had said.

Last week, Prime Minister Theresa May announced that snap general election would take place in the U.K. on June 8.

The UKIP increased its vote by 12.5 percent in 2015 general election from 3 percent but won only 1 seat in the House of Commons.

UKIP’s only member of parliament, Douglas Carswell, quit in March to become an independent MP, prompting a backlash from within the party and among its supporters.

The far-right group led the Leave campaign before the last June’s EU membership referendum under then-leader Nigel Farage.