Muslim parents appeal hijab ban in Russian court

Moscow, April 23 (IANS/RIA Novosti) Muslim parents whose children have not been allowed to wear headscarves or hijab to school in a southern Russian region have appealed to the Supreme Court.

The ban on hijabs for pupils in Stavropol region came into force in September 2012 after local authorities issued a ruling requiring schoolchildren to wear uniforms.

The uniform guidelines ban pupils from wearing brightly coloured clothes, veils, pants and skirts with a low waistline or high slits, and accessories depicting informal youth group symbols, as well as religious clothing.

The appeal was filed on behalf of Muslim families in Stavropol who are seeking to annul the school uniform requirements. A lower court rejected the lawsuit in March.

A similar legal case was launched in Siberia last month. A local TV station in Krasnoyarsk city reported that a female student from the Muslim-populated region of Dagestan was expelled from the city's medical school for wearing a headscarf on its premises.

Local prosecutors criticised the dismissal as violating education law and ordered the university to reinstate the student.

--IANS/RIA Novosti

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