03 10 2007 Pristina _ The parliamentary group for integration, led by the Islamic-oriented Party of Justice, has requested for Kosovo’s minister of education, Agim Veliu, to appear before parliament.
According to a press release issued by the Party of Justice on Tuesday afternoon, this comes in the wake of support given by the minister to the municipal department of education in a central Kosovo town to dismiss three Albanian Muslim girls from a local school because they were wearing headscarves.
The three girls were banned from the school in Skenderaj/Srbica, where the Kosovo Liberation Army, KLA campaign against Slobodan Milosevic’s regime began in the late 1990s.
Kosovo’s legislation on education forbids any kind of religious display in public schools.
Hilmi Jashari, Kosovo's acting ombudsperson, told Balkan Insight that the decision to exclude the girls reflected a misinterpretation of the law.
“The ministry has no legal basis to support such an action,” Jashari said, adding that the decision violated Kosovo’s law on freedom of religion, which bans discrimination "on the basis of religious convictions, of belonging or not belonging to a religious denomination or of the observance of religious ceremonies and rituals."
Most of Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanians are nominally Muslim, though predominantly secular. The argument over secular and religious claims in public life reflects similar arguments now taking place in Western Europe.
The minister's appearance before parliament has not been confirmed yet. (birn)
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