Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is introducing new measures to combat religious social control and the oppression of women in Danish educational institutions. These interventions include extending the ban on face coverings to schools and universities and removing prayer rooms. Frederiksen emphasizes that democracy takes precedence over religious practices in education.

The Prime Minister specifically aims to prohibit the use of the Islamic niqab in classrooms and eliminate prayer rooms from educational institutions. She believes these measures are necessary to ensure students are free from religious pressure and to prevent the oppression of girls and women.

The existing ban on face coverings, implemented in 2018, only applied to public spaces, a limitation Frederiksen now considers “a mistake.” She asserts that the establishment of prayer rooms in recent years is also unacceptable.

Instead of a formal state ban on prayer rooms, the ministers for schools and education will engage in dialogue with universities to discourage their presence. Frederiksen insists that this is not a matter of debate but a firm stance against their use as mechanisms of oppression.

These initiatives are a result of recommendations from the Commission for the Forgotten Women’s Struggle, which identified instances of students wearing niqabs in educational settings. While the exact extent of the issue is unknown, Frederiksen states that her opposition to the oppression of women is a driving factor.

Frederiksen dismisses the idea that prayer rooms could aid social mobility for young people from religious backgrounds. She argues that society should not accommodate fanaticism and that democracy must define social life, leaving no room for “extremism” in schools.