Parliamentarians from across Europe have unanimously passed a resolution opposing a general ban on wearing the burqa in public.
MPs representing all 47 member states of Europe's human rights watchdog, the Council of Europe, passed the measure, which is not legally binding on individual nations.
The MPs say a general ban would infringe the rights of those women who had decided of their own free will to cover their faces.
The council does say, however, that the veils could be banned when public security or professional obligations require women to show their faces.
