Two employees of Nancy’s “Association accueil et réinsertion sociale” (AARS) have been threatened with dismissal following the adoption of a neutrality clause in the association’s internal regulations.

The two employees have been with the association for three and four years respectively, and their headscarves have never caused any problems. However, on August 10, the AARS Board of Directors amended its internal regulations to include a new neutrality clause prohibiting employees from wearing religious symbols during working hours.

This new measure has provoked much indignation among the association’s employees, who have been mobilizing with their unions for several weeks to protest against the choice “left” to their two colleagues: remove their headscarves or leave.

This mobilization reached the ears of the new Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, who lent his full support to the association, with a tweet that left little doubt as to the discriminatory and Islamophobic policy he intends to pursue in the coming months.