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I tunesien har slør-tørklæder været forbudt offentligt siden 1981. Der er
dog flere og flere som går med det på gaden, - men det bliver stærkt
kritiseret af både presidenten og ministeren for religiøse anliggender.


The Tunisian president's comments come after a statement which was made at a
recent conference by al-Hadi Mihani, who is secretary feneral of the ruling
party, the Democratic Constitutional Assembly. Mihani condemned the
increased use of the hijab in Tunisia.

At a conference entitled "Safeguarding the originality of national
identity", Mihani spoke of those "who are attempting to mask political
issues with the face of religion."

He had said: "There is a need to mobilise against such phenomena, to defend
the Islamic faith, the rights of present and future generations, and the
country's identity. If we accept the headscarf today, tomorrow we will
accept that women lose their right to hold jobs and to vote, that they be
prohibited from studying and that they become solely a means of reproduction
and domestic labour."

The original decision to ban the hijab and other forms of "religious
attire", was made by former president Habib Bourguiba in 1981. The ban on
such items is defended by the authorities as not being against religion, but
against "extremist religious ways of dressing."

The fact that a historical Muslim country which has been Muslim for more
than 1,000 years still has issues with the hijab, only serves to highlight
the extreme political aspects of Britain's Muslims, who stridently demand
the right to wear the far more religiously extreme nikab or face-covering
veil. And what of British identity? Is that not worth defending as much as
Tunisia is defending its own heritage?



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Og i Marokko har man nu fjernet alle billeder af kvinder med slør i
skolebøgerne, en kvinderetskvinde siger at i Marokko er man afhængig af
folks tænkeevne - man har ikke olie - så der har man brug for kvinder i
samfunds- og erhvervslivet.

Også i Marokko ser man sløret - tørklædet, som islamisternes varemærke.



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Today, AKI reports that in Morocco, the hijab or headscarf, is being treated
as something culturally "alien", as it is in Tunisia.

The images of a hijab-clad woman have been removed from the country's copies
of school textbooks. Author and intellectual Fatema Mernissi has commended
the decision to remove the images, as it was taken after consultation with
womens' rights activists. She said: "For the first time in Moroccan history,
civically active women were invited as part of the team charged to re-write
school textbooks....And they argued: 'Children shouldn't be forced to think
that the veil is a necessary tool'."

The removal of the hijab images was announced this month, following pressure
from women's rights groups in this Muslim country, which is said to have the
most progressive laws on the rights of women, including family law, in the
Arab world.

Ms Mernissi states that Morocco is combatting fundamentalism and promoting
moderate interpretations of Islam. The removal of the hijab image was part
of the drive to reduce fundamentalist influences on young people.

She said: "You have to remember that because Morocco has no oil wealth, we
are betting on the human brain as the privileged energy source. By including
women's brains in the public strategies, Morocco is betting on a human
intelligence-fuelled future."

She says that policy makers are trying to "democratise access to public
offices such as enforcing women's rights to be judges in courts or to be
imams in mosques."

She is, however, against the banning of these items of clothing.