SECULAR TURKEY PROTESTS AGAINST HIJAB

PanARMENIAN.Net
04.02.2008 13:36 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Thousands of secularist Turks took to the streets on
Saturday, February 2, against government plans to lift a decades-long
ban on hijab on campus, warning the lift could undermine Turkey’s
secularism.

"Turkey is secular and will remain secular," shouted protesters
as they waved Turkish flags and banners of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk,
the emblematic leader who threw religion out of public life as he
rebuilt Turkey from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.

"We are concerned that universities will plunge into a chaotic
environment and opposing groups will start clashing with each other,"
Professor Mustafa Akaydin, the chairman of the oversight board at
Ankara’s Middle East Technical University, said in a statement.

Reuters reported.

The ruling Justice and Development Party and the far-right Nationalist
Action Party (MHP) opposition party have agreed a constitutional
amendment to allow a compromise headscarf on campus. Under the deal
between the two parties, women and girls at universities are permitted
to cover their heads by tying the headscarf in the traditional way
beneath the chin.

A majority of women use the traditional "basortusu" – head cover in
Turkish – that is more or less loosely knotted under the chin for
protection against the elements or for modesty. It can come off just
as easily as it can be tied on and raises no objections.

But the ban would remain on the wrap-round headscarf, which secularists
claim is associated with political Islam, as well as face-veil.

Together, the AKP and the MHP easily have the two-thirds parliamentary
majority required to amend the constitution. The Turkish parliament
is expected to approve the amendment this week.

According to Director of Institute of Oriental Studies at the RA
Academy of Sciences, Dr Ruben Safrastyan, the Turkish bill permitting
to wear hijabs proves consolidation of Islamic spirit and deviation
from the ideas promulgated by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of
the Turkish secular state. "It’s quite possible that the restrained
statement by Turkish military, who guarantee the Ataturk Constitution,
is conditioned by a kind of agreement sealed by the AKP and the
General Staff on "disclosure" of Ergenekon," the Armenian expert said.