Amina Sboui, a young feminist activist who fled her native Tunisia last year, was detained by police on Wednesday night in Paris after an altercation with a woman who was wearing a Muslim veil.

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The physical confrontation took place near Place de la Bastille around 9pm, after Amina and her boyfriend traded insults with another couple that included the headscarf-clad woman, according to a police source.

A friend who claimed she had witnessed the fight said on Facebook that Amina and her companion were covered in blood when officers arrived on the scene.

The friend complained that the couple was unjustly held overnight at a police station.

Amina, 19, already faces legal woes in France. In July she filed a police report alleging that she had been attacked by five Islamists in Paris, but French investigating judges say her report is fraudulent.

The young Tunisian first gained prominence in March 2013, after she posted a photo of herself topless on Facebook amid the country’s political crisis.

She received the support of the feminist, Ukrainian-born Femen movement, whose members have gained notoriety for bearing their breasts as a form of protest.

In May 2013, she was arrested after spray-painting the word “Femen” on the wall of a cemetery in Tunis, and spent more than two months in detention.

However, she later quit the Femen movement, accusing it of being “Islamophobic”.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

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