Veiled Injustice: The ECtHR’s Enduring Stance against the Headscarf
by Ahmet Said Aydil
Question(s) at stake
Whether the Turkish authorities’ enforcement of a school dress code, and the resulting restriction on the applicants’ access to education arising from the ban on Islamic headscarves, violated the applicants’ rights under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
Outcome of the ruling
The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) declared the applicants’ complaints inadmissible under several articles of the Convention. It concluded that the enforcement of the school dress code, which included a ban on wearing the Islamic headscarf, was not incompatible with the applicants’ rights to freedom of expression or religion. The Court found that the dress code pursued legitimate aims, such as preserving neutrality and secularism in schools. It also rejected the applicants’ complaints about arbitrary detention, noting that their brief detentions were neither arbitrary nor disproportionate. The Court found no violation of the right to peaceful assembly, as the measures taken to disperse the assembly were proportionate to the circumstances.
Country:
Official citation
Köse and Others v. Turkey, App. no. 26625/02, 24 January 2006
Topic(s)
Keywords:
Freedom of thought, conscience and religion Laïcite Religious and cultural symbols Margin of appreciation
Tag(s):
Laiklik Secularism İmam-Hatip Schools
Bibliographic information
Access case report
View case report in the CUREDI databaseAbout the authors
Ahmet Said Aydil (Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Department Law and Anthropology, Germany)
Ahmet Said Aydil is a PhD Candidate in the Law and Anthropology Department at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Bilkent University (Ankara, Turkiye). Following his graduation, he completed his legal internship, working in areas such as commercial law, international arbitration law, criminal law, and administrative law. In 2020 he passed the Turkish Bar and became a licensed attorney.
Aydil also holds an LLM from the Europa Institute, Saarland University, in International and European Human Rights Protection Law and European Economic Law. Under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Thomas Giegrich, his master’s thesis analysed the decline in human rights commitmens in Europe, driven by the rise of populist politics and the mishandling of the refugee influx of 2015, and evaluated potential remedies at the European Union and Council of Europe levels. His current research falls within the framework of the database project “Cultural and Religious Diversity under State Law across Europe” (CUREDI) at the MPI.