Turkish Council of State stands against headscarf ban

ANKARA - Anatolia News Agency

Last week, a court in Ankara delayed a divorce trial because one of the lawyers, Zübeyde Kamalak (L), was wearing a headscarf. AA photo

Turkish lawyers with headscarves are free to enter courtrooms as the Council of State today rejected a Turkish Bar Association appeal regarding the ban.

The Council of State rejected the Bar Association’s appeal to the stay of execution on the headscarf ban in courtrooms.

The Turkish Bar Association has made an appeal into the Council of State, which has issued a stay of execution on the Bar code’s 20th article, which said, “Lawyers and apprentice lawyers work with clothes suitable to their profession and with their heads uncovered.”

The Council of State had initially made the ruling upon an application by a lawyer, who was rejected by the Bar for submitting a photograph of herself wearing a headscarf for her identity card.

Last month, an umbrella trade union known as the Confederation of Public Servants’ Trade Unions (Memur-Sen) said it had collected 12.3 million signatures in a petition campaign to lift a ban on wearing headscarves in government offices.

“We do not want to wear the uniforms designed by pro-coup mindset and we declare that we will not wear them,” said head of Memur Sen Ahmet Gündoğdu.

Last week, a court in Ankara delayed a divorce trial because one of the lawyers, Zübeyde Kamalak, was wearing a headscarf.