Meloni promises to ban veils in Italian schools and limit foreign students
"Italian children cannot feel like a minority in the classroom," the country’s PM said Sunday.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has pledged to introduce legislation that would prohibit face coverings in schools and impose limits on the number of foreign students enrolled in classrooms. Speaking at the Fenix event, a youth gathering organized by her party, Meloni emphasized the importance of ensuring Italian children do not feel like a minority in their classrooms.
She stated that if the number of non-Italian-speaking students becomes significant, or even a majority, it would no longer be considered integration, but rather neglect. Currently, nearly 930,000 students who do not hold Italian citizenship make up about 11.6% of the country's school population, according to research from Fondazione ISMU.
Over the past decade, the number of foreign minors in Italy has declined by 4.5%. Meloni's government came to power with the backing of voters concerned about immigration, and tackling migration was a central theme of her campaign. This announcement is not Meloni's first attempt to regulate face coverings; her party previously proposed banning burqas and niqabs in all public spaces, arguing it was a response to "Islamic separatism." The bill is currently under consideration in the Italian lower house.
Written by urgent.news from Politico EU's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
