Brussels - The Belgian Dutch-speaking region of Flanders is to ban the wearing of the Islamic headscarf in state-run schools, officials announced Friday after 10 days of confrontations with the Muslim minority over the issue. The decision by the authorities of Belgium's Dutch-speaking community, who are responsible for education, comes with immediate effect, but will allow a one-year period of grace for those schools which have not yet brought in a ban of their own.
An exception will be made for religious classes, the Belga news agency reported.
Hitherto, each school in Flanders has had the right to decide whether to allow the scarf. Around one third of the 700 schools in the region had banned the headscarf, one third explicitly allowed it, and one-third had no rule.
The system had been credited with minimizing tension over the issue by allowing each school to consult with its own community.
But trouble flared on September 1 when two schools in the port city of Antwerp and the nearby town of Hoboken brought in their own ban.
The schools said the move was necessary because some of their girl pupils were being bullied by classmates into wearing the headscarf against their will.
But the move sparked demonstrations from Muslim pupils. At the weekend, unknown vandals broke into the Hoboken school, scrawling "no headscarf, no pupil" over the walls and wrecking one classroom.
Simultaneously, a Muslim schoolgirl challenged the ban's legality. The authorities ruled that the schools in question had overstepped their rights, and that the government of the Dutch-speaking community would have to decide on such a ban.
