World Bulletin / News Desk

Main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) MP Dilek Akagun Yilmaz has started a passive protest in the Turkish parliament on Wednesday. 

MP Yilmaz wore a poster her back as the Turkish paliament meeting commenced. On the poster the words"Turkey will not be Iran"was written.

While the CHP deputy continued to protest, deputy speaker Aysenur Bahcekapili warned the other deputies against joining the protest.

The leader of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) has said the era in which the party had been exploiting the headscarf issue was now over after his party showed restraint when four headscarved lawmakers entered Parliament. 

On the contrary, however, party deputy Yilmaz protested against the headscarved lawmakers by wearing an Mustafa Kemal Ataturk t-shirt, in dedication to the founder of the secular republic.

The arrival into the assembly of the four MPs, Sevde Beyazit, Gulay Samanci, Nurcan Darbulak and Gonul Bekin Sahkulubey, all members of Erdogan's Justice and Development (AK) Party, was largely uneventful, a far cry from the last time a headscarved woman entered the parliament fourteen years ago.

The concluding attempt by the AK Party concerning the headscarf issue came with PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan's declaration on September 30 of the Democratization Package, which opened the gates of state institutions to women wearing headscarves. It also introduced a number of reforms regarding political rights, such as the election threshold, party organization, propaganda in non-Turkish languages, abolishment of the student oath, freedom of education in different languages and dialects at private schools, legal guarantees on personal data and deterrence for crimes of discrimination.

Headscarves are now allowed in all public offices except in the judiciary and military.

Former Turkish MP Merve Kavakci had been forced to leave the assembly on her first day as MP amid a torrent of protesting applause on May 2, 1999.