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Düsseldorf (dpa) - Employees of the judiciary in North Rhine-Westphalia are not allowed to wear any religious symbols or items of clothing - such as cross, headscarf, kippa - in courts and when exercising sovereign activities.
This is stipulated by a law that the Düsseldorf state parliament passed on Wednesday evening.
The prohibition also includes symbols or clothing that express ideological positions.
The new regulation applies to judges, public prosecutors, trainee lawyers and all other judicial employees involved in official activities.
The external appearance of members of the judiciary should not give the slightest impression of bias, stressed NRW Minister of Justice Peter Biesenbach (CDU) in the debate.
The initiative for the law came from the black and yellow state government in 2018.
Experts had expressed some serious concerns on some points.
In fact, the regulation mainly affects Muslim women wearing headscarves.
In addition, the law extends the ban on covering the face.
All employees of the judiciary should “not cover their face when performing the service or in an activity directly related to the service, unless this is necessary for business or health reasons”.
The ban had already applied to judges and civil servants.
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© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210303-99-676420 / 2