PARIS: A law banning the Muslim headscarf and other religious symbols from French schools will only aggravate a sense of segregation, several teachers and social scientists say.

French President Jacques Chirac has announced that parliament will pass a law within the next few months banning students from wearing prominent religious symbols to school.

Chirac said the law would ban “all noticeable religious symbols.” He named specifically “the Muslim headscarf, big crucifixes and the Jewish kippa.” The Sikh turban would also be banned.

Three teachers unions said such a law would “stigmatize a part of the French population.”

Small religious signs such as a David star which cannot be seen as an effort to proselytize would be permitted, Chirac said.

“The proposed law doesn’t help teachers confronting conflicts in schools,” said Gerard Aschieri, leader of the United Unions Federation (FSU, after its French name). French legislation already guarantees the neutrality of the state towards religion, Aschieri said. “

The debate over the headscarf has been around for years. It arose first in 1989 when two girls wore them to school. The state council, equivalent to a constitution court, ruled then that girls could wear the headscarf so long as they did not try to convert others.

The controversy came to a head in September this year after two girls were expelled from a public school for wearing Muslim headscarves and tunics to class.—Dawn/The InterPress News Service.