PARIS, Feb. 10 (UPI) -- A plan to ban Muslim headscarves and other religious symbols in French schools inched closer to law Tuesday as France's National Assembly voted overwhelmingly in favor of the legislation.
Out of the National Assembly's 577 deputies, 494 voted in favor of a bill to ban Muslim headscarves, Jewish skullcaps
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Only members of France's smaller Communist and Republican parties voted against the measure. The UDF party
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The landslide majority was cobbled after a last-minute agreement by the opposition Socialist Party agreed to vote in favor of the bill.
The Socialists had wanted the text to be hardened to ban all visible -- rather than merely conspicuous -- religious symbols. That tougher wording would also mean forbidding students from wearing small crosses, Muslim hands of Fatma and other less-obvious signs of their faith.
But the Socialists won a small concession
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The French Senate is expected to vote on a similar text
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That means that French public school students will likely face such a ban when the next school year begins in September. The measure would not apply to university students or those going to private school.
Much of the drive to ban religious symbols in school stemmed from highly publicized cases involving Muslim girls who insisted on attending school wearing headscarves.
In some ways
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In other cases, school administrators have looked the other way, or worked out a compromise with the pupils. Muslim girls have also dropped out of public schools, a trend some fear may rise with the ban.
Nonetheless, those supporting such a religious symbols ban argue the issue touches the very heart of France's cherished secularity. French public schools should foster learning and citizenship, they assert -- not religious and cultural differences.
A January poll found the majority of French supported a religious symbols ban in public schools. But a separate survey last month found the majority of France's estimated 5 million Muslims were against the legislation
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Jewish and Christian leaders, along with several foreign governments
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Still others argue the ban merely papers over larger problems of discrimination and marginalization of France's sizable immigrant and minority populations.Related Topics Articles：
