Village Journals
Resonate your identity with Naseeb journals. Express your opinions, share your thoughts, post your writings and connect with like minded people through the power of expression.
Resonate your identity with Naseeb journals. Express your opinions, share your thoughts, post your writings and connect with like minded people through the power of expression.
Court annuls Turkish scarf reform
news.bbc.co.uk
Page last updated at 15:20 GMT, Thursday, 5 June 2008 16:20 UK
Court annuls Turkish scarf reform
Turkey's highest court has blocked government moves to allow college students to wear Muslim headscarves.
The Constitutional Court said that a vote by parliament to ease a ban on scarves being worn on campuses violated the constitution's secular principles.
The government argues that a headscarf ban stops many girls being educated.
But much of the secular establishment resisted the move, seeing it as a step towards allowing Islam to figure more largely in Turkish public life.
The ruling, by a panel of 11 judges, could influence the outcome of a separate court case in which the ruling AK Party could be banned for anti-secular activities.
Some 71 members of the party, including the prime minister and the president, could also be banned from belonging to a political party for five years.
The headscarf ban is seen by some as one of the cornerstones of the secular state.
The secularist establishment, which includes the army, courts and universities, is opposed to any reform of the ban.
The AK Party, which was re-elected last year with a convincing 47% of the vote, says it is a matter of personal and religious freedom.
Page last updated at 15:20 GMT, Thursday, 5 June 2008 16:20 UK
Court annuls Turkish scarf reform
Turkey's highest court has blocked government moves to allow college students to wear Muslim headscarves.
The Constitutional Court said that a vote by parliament to ease a ban on scarves being worn on campuses violated the constitution's secular principles.
The government argues that a headscarf ban stops many girls being educated.
But much of the secular establishment resisted the move, seeing it as a step towards allowing Islam to figure more largely in Turkish public life.
The ruling, by a panel of 11 judges, could influence the outcome of a separate court case in which the ruling AK Party could be banned for anti-secular activities.
Some 71 members of the party, including the prime minister and the president, could also be banned from belonging to a political party for five years.
The headscarf ban is seen by some as one of the cornerstones of the secular state.
The secularist establishment, which includes the army, courts and universities, is opposed to any reform of the ban.
The AK Party, which was re-elected last year with a convincing 47% of the vote, says it is a matter of personal and religious freedom.