Laurent Nuñez on Tuesday assessed the “importance of launching the third phase” of government action against radical Islamic “enthusiasm”, affirming that “republican laws will always be superior to religious laws wherever they come from”.
“It is important to give a clear and precise response to those who might argue that Sharia law can be applied on French territory: this is not possible,” the Interior Minister added while listening to a National Assembly commission of inquiry into the relationship between political groups and Islamism.
“Republican law will always be superior to religious law wherever it comes from, whatever form it takes, including sharia law,” he assured.
Assessing that there is “an urgency to launch phase 3 regarding entryism”, Laurent Nuñez assured that he has “no hesitation” regarding this, or “a shadow of doubt”. He stated that the government lacked the tools to act to combat “Islamic political entryism”: these tools were found in the anti-terrorism and separatism laws but could not be applied to “entryism”, he said.
“Serious threat to public order”
Because, he explained, “entryism” is “not related to violence” or terrorism, so it does not have criminal qualifications to pursue or disband this or that movement.
In this case, the Minister cited the possibility of violations that “damage national cohesion”, because the qualification “serious threat to public order” does not apply to entryism. He said there was also a lack of “asset freezing measures for all these measures” as well as “increased control over the admission of minors”.
In addition, the government is also studying the possibility of allowing prefects to approve permits for building places of worship, depending on whether they are suspected of committing violations or not.
