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Turkish court considers headscarf ruling - cyrano - 06-05-2008 03:36 PM

By Vincent Boland in Istanbul

Turkey’s constitutional court was meeting on Thursday to decide whether women wearing the Muslim headscarf can attend university, in a case that could affect the survival of the ruling party.

The government of the Justice and Development party (AKP), which has its roots in political Islam, passed legislation in February that is supposed to lift the constitutional ban on the headscarf on campus. The measure is opposed by the secular establishment, which sees it as a step towards a more Islamic-style society.

The court will rule on the legality of the two amendments passed by parliament, where the AKP has a huge majority. The verdict in the case could offer pointers to how the same court will rule in a separate but closely linked petition before the 11 judges – a demand by Turkey’s senior prosecutor to close the AKP, based in part on its headscarf initiative.

The case is being closely watched by the financial markets, which are nervous about the impact of Turkey’s latest political stand-off. Investors are already worried about the slowing economy, a gaping current account deficit, an apparent slacking of the government’s structural reform programme, and the credibility of the central bank, which sowed confusion about monetary policy on Tuesday when it abruptly raised its medium-term inflation targets.

Turkish markets were relatively stable on Thursday, but analysts said the mood among investors remained nervous and tentative.

The judges on the constitutional court are under intense political and public scrutiny as they deliberate on the headscarf issue. Their verdict could come as early as Thursday evening, or it could be delayed until Friday. Their deliberations are not helped, some analysts said, by the vague wording of the two constitutional amendments they must consider, and even whether the changes proposed by the government are sufficient by themselves to lift the headscarf ban.

The case to throw out the amendments was brought by the Republican People’s party, the main opposition group in parliament and an opponent of nearly every measure introduced by the government.

The prosecutor who is seeking to ban the AKP has cited the constitutional amendments in his closure argument, which accuses the party of being “a centre of anti-secular activities”, an accusation the government strongly denies. But some analysts say there are procedural and legal technicalities that mean the court’s headscarf ruling may have no bearing on the closure case, because of the court’s limited powers in considering the legality of constitutional amendments.

Tolga Ediz, an economist at Lehman Brothers, argued in a note to clients on Thursday that the likely outcome was that the court would accept the validity of the constitutional amendments but would clarify that they do not allow women to wear the headscarf on campus unless there are further legislative changes to the law on higher education.

Turkey’s constitutional ban on the headscarf in public spaces such as the campuses of state universities has been upheld twice by the European Court of Human Rights, which argued that it did not infringe personal freedoms, which is the argument the government uses for lifting it.