Despite drawing criticism from human rights groups such as Amnesty International, France’s controversial ban on its Olympic athletes competing in a hijab is set to go ahead. The rule could mean that Team France athletes, including sprinter Sounkamba Sylla, will miss the opening ceremony due to wearing a hijab or be forced to wear a cap to avoid the ban.

On Wednesday, David Lappartient, president of the French Olympic Committee, reiterated that French Olympians are bound by the secular principles that apply to public sector workers in France, separating state and church, which includes a ban on hijabs.

In January 2022, the French senate voted 160 to 143 to ban the wearing of the hijab and other “ostensible religious symbols” in sports competitions following a proposed amendment from Les Républicains, a right-wing party that argued that headscarves can risk the safety of athletes wearing them, despite multiple large sports clothing brands creating sport-specific hijabs.

It’s not just the Olympic Games affected by the ban, either. In June 2023, the council of state, France’s highest administrative court, said the French Football Federation was entitled to ban the hijab.

In response to the ban, Sylla, a member of France’s 400-metre women’s and mixed relay teams, shared her frustration on social media, writing: “You are selected for the Olympics, organised in your country, but you can’t participate in the opening ceremony because you wear a headscarf.”

Basketball player Diaba Konate also told BBC Sport that her heart “was broken” by the ban, adding: “It’s very hypocritical for France to call itself the country of freedom, of human rights, but at the same time not allowing Muslims or their citizens to show who they are.”

Amnesty International has said that the ban exposes “discriminatory double standards ahead of the Olympic and Paralympic Games” and “makes a mockery of claims that Paris 2024 is the first gender-equal Olympics”.

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