MOSCOW, July 10 (RIA Novosti) – The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a ban on wearing Muslim headscarves to school in southern Russia, the RAPSI legal news agency reported.
The court ruled that the ban did not violate freedom of faith or the right to education with regard to Muslim schoolgirls. It said that every school has the right to decide what its students may or may not wear.
The ban on hijabs for schoolchildren in the southern Stavropol Region came into effect last September after local authorities issued a ruling requiring schoolchildren to wear uniforms.
In late April, parents challenged the ban in the Supreme Court after a regional court rejected their lawsuit in March.
A representative of the Prosecutor General's Office told the court that the Stavropol administration's decision to introduce school uniforms was “not a local whim” but was in line with federal legislation, “which stipulates the secular nature of education in Russia.”
