Eiffel Tower shut by staff strike over women being moved for religious visit

The Eiffel Tower was closed on Monday after staff went on strike over female workers being removed for the visit of a Hindu religious group, workers and management said.

A delegation of around 100 people linked to the Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) group visited the landmark in the French capital on Saturday.

Staff union representative Diane Davoine says as they arrived at the monument, women were told to move.

“During the visit of this delegation, women were asked to leave their places of work in order to place men there,” she told Reuters. Davoine also said management had since apologised to workers over the incident.

“So that absolutely does not go down well with the employees, with women obviously, who are all humiliated by what happened, by the way some were treated,” Davoine said.

She added: “Tensions mounted over the weekend, so this morning, the employees decided to meet: first, to open a dialogue with management, and second, to ensure that women are never treated this way at the company again.”

Société d’Exploitation de la tour Eiffel (SETE), the company that operates the monument in Paris, confirmed the delegation had asked the visit be organised to limit “interactions with women”, according to the AFP news agency.

The firm told AFP that “these conditions should not have been accepted”.

They added they “were not in line with SETE’s values, nor with the principles of equality between men and women”.

SETE president Ariel Weil said: “It is clearly not an acceptable practice.

“I restate the Eiffel Tower’s commitment to republican values and to the equality of men and women.”

The BBC has contacted the Union Confédération générale du travail (CGT) for a response.