Eiffel Tower closed in row over women removed for Hindu group
Staff condemned instructions that led to female employees being "sidelined, replaced and made invisible because of their sex."
The Eiffel Tower was closed on Monday due to a staff strike. The strike was in response to an incident on Saturday when a Hindu religious group, Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS), visited the landmark. According to Diane Davoine, a staff union representative, women were told to leave their workplaces to make way for men during the visit.
The company that operates the Eiffel Tower, Société d’Exploitation de la tour Eiffel (SETE), confirmed that the BAPS delegation had requested the visit be organised to limit “interactions with women”. SETE admitted that this request should not have been accepted and was not in line with the company's values. Management has since apologised to workers over the incident.
The BAPS Hindu temple in Paris has released a statement apologising for any pain or inconvenience caused. The Eiffel Tower has since reopened, although details of when the staff strike ended are not specified.
Brief written by urgent.news from Euronews, Tempo.co English, KahawaTungu, MyJoyOnline Ghana, The Indian Express — 5 reports on this story. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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