LONDON: The newly announced London mayoral candidate for the right-wing British party Reform UK faced criticism on Friday following comments suggesting women wearing the burqa should be subject to police stop-and-search, The Guardian newspaper reported.

Speaking on a podcast, Laila Cunningham said that in an “open society” people should not cover their faces, adding that it “has to be assumed” those who do so are doing it “for a criminal reason.”

She also argued that London should have “one civic culture” which “should be British,” claiming parts of the British capital felt culturally different due to the visibility of Muslim communities.

The remarks prompted concern from Muslim organizations, with Shaista Gohir, chief executive of the Muslim Women’s Network UK, describing the comments as “dangerous” and a “dog whistle” that could further alienate Muslim women.

She warned they risked emboldening abuse, adding: “The number of Muslim women who wear the burqa in this country is tiny, and yet this is what has been chosen as a focus.”

Gohir said her organisation had recently seen a rise in threatening and Islamophobic correspondence, arguing that Cunningham’s comments were “sending a message to Muslims that they do not belong.”

Afzal Khan, a Labour MP based in Manchester, called Cunningham’s comments a “deliberate and cynical ploy”, adding it was “about divisive ideas being pumped into the society deliberately for electoral benefits.”

London Mayor Sadiq Khan also criticized attempts to stoke division, saying that the role of mayor was to bring communities together.

“Almost without argument, our city is the greatest city in the world because of our diversity,” he said, adding that freedom of religion and expression were “quintessentially British rights.”

Cunningham, a former Crown Prosecution Service prosecutor and British-born Muslim, was confirmed as Reform UK’s London mayoral candidate last week.

The issue of face coverings has previously sparked internal debate within Reform, with senior figures having distanced the party from earlier calls for a burqa ban.