🚁pinochetist​⚡⚡

Azerbaijan, where approximately 96% of the population identifies as Muslim, has introduced new secular dress-code regulations that effectively prohibit female students and teachers from wearing Islamic headscarves in state schools, triggering protests, classroom boycotts and dozens of arrests. Female students have been turned away from classrooms, while teachers in Baku and Sumgayit reported being instructed to remove their headscarves or resign. The restrictions have sparked protests across several areas, including Baku, Jalilabad and Masally, with students gathering outside schools and boycotting classes in solidarity with classmates denied entry. Azerbaijan's Interior Ministry announced that 37 people had been detained over disturbances connected to the protests. Authorities reported attempts to set fire to a school and a school director's vehicle in separate incidents. Oktay Saral, an adviser to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, condemned the restrictions and urged Azerbaijan to reverse them. Azerbaijan's ruling New Azerbaijan Party, led by President Ilham Aliyev, responded by accusing Turkish governing-party figures of interfering in the country's domestic affairs. The party defended the regulations as measures intended to uphold secularism, equality and a unified educational environment, warning that Turkey had no right to impose its political or religious views on Azerbaijan.