Swiss Muslim girls must take swimming classes with boys

Strasbourg : Muslim parents in Switzerland cannot refuse to send their daughters to school-run swimming lessons with boys, Europe's top rights court said Tuesday, dismissing a challenge by a Turkish-Swiss couple claiming the rule violated their beliefs.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) accepted that the refusal by Swiss authorities to exempt the couple's two daughters from the compulsory lessons interfered with their freedom of religion.

But the interference, it ruled, was justified by the need to protect the children from social exclusion.

School has become the focal point in several high-profile battles between Swiss authorities and Muslim families who say their religion prevents their children from participating in some mixed activities.

Last year, a high-profile case involving Muslim pupils in the northern canton of Basel refusing to shake hands with their female teachers caused an uproar. 

School plays "a special role in the process of social integration, particularly where children of foreign origin were concerned," the ECHR, which is based in the French city of Strasbourg, said.

Swimming lessons are "not just to learn to swim, but above all to take part in that activity with all the other pupils", it added.

Several parents in Switzerland have incurred fines in recent years for keeping their daughters home from obligatory swimming lessons.

The case in Strasbourg was brought by Aziz Osmanoglu and his partner Sehabat Kocabas, a Turkish-Swiss couple living in Basel, who were among a handful of parents fined in 2010 for refusing to allow their daughters to take part in swimming lessons. All of the girls concerned were aged under 10.

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