Turkish father wins fight to get girl out of religious class

Turkish father wins fight to get girl out of religious class - Independent Online Edition > Europe

A Turkish father has won his six-year struggle to have his daughter removed from compulsory religious education classes in a case that highlights the tensions between Turkish secularism and its hopes of European integration.

Hasan Zengin's struggle dates from 2001, when he failed to convince local authorities to exempt his daughter from religious lessons at school. Three years after it agreed to view his case, the European Court of Human Rights has finally ruled that Turkey breached its obligation "to respect the rights of parents to ensure education in conformity with their own religious ... convictions".

Like at least 10 per cent of Turks, Mr Zengin is an Alevi, member of a sect whose beliefs, influenced by Sufism and pre-Islamic practices, are distantly related to Shia Islam. The ECHR described the syllabus as so slanted towards Sunni Islam that it "cannot be considered to meet the criteria of objectivity and pluralism".

Mr Zengin's lawyer, Kazim Genc, believes the judgment could not have been better timed. The rights and wrongs of compulsory religious courses has been heavily debated recently as part of discussions over plans for a new constitution. "The ECHR has solved the problem – religious lessons have to come out of the new constitution," he says.

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