My compliments to your columnist Daphne Caruana Galizia on her piece entitled "Malta is a free country. So ban the burqa/niqab" (TMIS, 12 July)

While presenting very cogent reasons why this garment should be banned, she makes rather light of the security implications involved in people wearing it.

I wish to remind her that following the attempt to blow up the Tube in London on 21 July 2005, Yassin Omar, escaped by bus from London to Birmingham in disguise by wearing a burqa with a handbag over his arm.

Mr Omar, originally from Somalia, arrived in the UK as a child dependent of asylum seekers in 1992 and was granted indefinite leave to remain in the UK in 2000.

He was found guilty at Woolwich Crown Court of conspiracy to murder^[ and was sentenced to life imprisonment, with a minimum of 40 years before being considered for release. 

The burqa can be used and indeed has been used in terrorist acts and this is yet another reason why it should be banned.

Charles A. Gauci

Sannat