Austria has issued 50 fines to transgressors of the full face covering ban in the first six months since it was enacted, each carrying a punishment of up to €150.
In a sign of how effective the ban has been in changing behaviour and discouraging the garment in public places in the nation, the majority of the 50 fine issued were in the first two months after October 2017 when the ban came into effect.
The fines were also predominantly localised to Vienna — Austria’s capital and most cosmopolitan city, with just nine in Lower Austria, and six in Tyrol, reports top Austrian newspaper Kronen Zeitung.
The number of fines given out in the early days of the ban were inflated by activists deliberately provoking police with full face coverings, with Ministry spokesman Alexander Marakovits remarking these actions may have been to see whether police would actually enforce the law. To avoid having to issue fines to visitors to Austria, the nation’s foreign ministry issued guidelines to foreign tourists from countries where full-face veiling for women is common, warning them the practice was not accepted in Austria. [Breitbart London] Read more
