Canberra, Australia. Muslim women would have to remove veils and show their faces to police on request or risk jail time under proposed new laws in Australia’s most populous state.

The debate the proposal has triggered reflects the cultural clashes ignited by the growing influx of Muslim immigrants and the unease visible symbols of Islam are causing in predominantly white, Christian Australia.

Under the law proposed by the government of New South Wales, a woman who defies police by refusing to remove her face veil could be sentenced to a year in prison and fined 5,500 Australian dollars ($5,900).

The bill — to be voted on by state parliament in August — has been condemned by civil libertarians and Muslims as an overreaction to a traffic offense case involving a Muslim woman driver in a niqab, or a veil that reveals only the eyes.

The government says the law would require motorists and criminal suspects to remove any head coverings so that police can identify them.

Critics say the bill smacks of anti-Muslim bias given how few women in Australia wear burqas. In a population of 23 million, only about 400,000 Australians are Muslim. Community advocates say that fewer than 2,000 women wear face veils, and it’s likely even a smaller percentage drives.

“It does seem to be very heavy-handed, and there doesn’t seem to be a need,” Australian Council for Civil Liberties spokesman David Bernie said. “It shows some cultural insensitivity.”

Bernie points out that while a bandit in a veil and sunglasses had robbed a Sydney convenience store last year, there were no Australian crime trends involving Muslim women’s clothing.

“We’re going to feel very intimidated and our privacy is being invaded,” said Mouna Unnjinal, who has driven in Sydney in a niqab for 18 years and never been cited for a traffic offense.

Unnjinal said she would not hesitate to show her face to a policewoman, but she fears racist male police officers might misuse the law to deliberately intimidate Muslim women.

New South Wales decided to create the law on July 4 in response to Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione’s call for greater police powers. Other states, including Victoria and Western Australia, are also considering similar legislation.

The laws were motivated by the bungled prosecution of Carnita Matthews, a 47-year-old Muslim woman who was booked by a highway patrolman for a minor traffic infringement in Sydney in June last year.

An official complaint was made in Matthews’ name against Senior Constable Paul Fogarty, the policeman who gave her the ticket. The complaint accused Fogarty of racism and attempting to tear off her veil during their roadside encounter.

The incident was recorded by a camera inside Fogarty’s squad car. The footage showed her aggressively berating a restrained Fogarty and did not support her claim that he tried to grab her veil before she reluctantly and angrily lifted it to show her face.

Matthews was sentenced in November to six months in jail for making a deliberately false statement to police. That conviction was quashed on appeal last month, though, because a judge was not convinced it was Matthews who signed the false statutory declaration. The woman who signed the document had worn a burqa, and the justice of the peace had not looked beneath the veil to confirm her identity.

Bernie said the proposed law pandered to public anger against Muslims, a symptom of the suspicion with which immigrants are viewed.

“I wouldn’t like to go and say this is Muslim bashing,” said Ikebal Patel, president of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils. “But I think the timing of this was really bad for Muslims.”

Source: Associated Press