(CBC) Two civil rights groups are seeking an appeal after a Quebec Superior Court justice refused their emergency request to temporarily freeze parts of the province’s new religious symbols law.
The National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association filed the leave to appeal at Quebec’s Court of Appeal on Monday.
“This bill must be stopped now. That is because Bill 21 at its core is about separating us from each other,” said Mustafa Farooq, NCCM’s executive director, on the steps of the Appeal Court on Tuesday.
The law, formerly known as Bill 21, was passed by the Coalition Avenir Québec government last month and seeks to affirm laicity, or secularism, within the province’s civil service.
