ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Parliament voted Saturday to amend the constitution to lift a decades-old ban on Islamic head scarves at Turkey's universities, despite fierce opposition from the secular establishment.

Tens of thousands of Turks demonstrated in the capital, Ankara, against the amendments and called for the government's resignation. "Turkey is secular and will remain secular," they chanted, many waving flags.

Head scarves have long been prohibited at universities in predominantly Muslim but fiercely secular Turkey, a country seeking to join the European Union.

But Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called the ban a trial for young Muslim women who are forced to remove their head scarves at campus entrances, noting that some resort to wearing wigs to class to cover their heads.

In a final vote Saturday, lawmakers voted 411-103 to approve two constitutional amendments that will add paragraphs saying everyone has the right to equal treatment from state institutions and "no one can be deprived of (his or her) right to higher education."

Read the entire article and view photos at the above link

See also latimes.com
brisbanetimes.com.au
and especially this editorial: Academic: Interact with the Women Underneath the Headscarf!