The U.N. report recommended that France must guarantee that children are not excluded or marginalized from the school system

GENEVA, June 4 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child Friday, June 4, urged France to ensure its ban on the wearing of Islamic headscarves and other religious insignia in schools does not unintentionally lead to young girls being pushed out of the education system.

The committee said in a report that France should ensure individual rights were not violated and children were not excluded from schools as a result of the new law, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

"The committee recommends that the (French) state ... consider alternative means, including mediation, of ensuring the secular character of public schools, while guaranteeing that individual rights are not infringed upon and that children are not excluded or marginalized from the school system and other settings as a result of such legislation," it said in its recommendations to Paris .

"(The law) may be counterproductive, by neglecting the principle of the best interest of the child and the right of the child to access to education, and not achieve the expected results," the group of 18 independent experts continued.

On Tuesday, February 10, France's lower house of parliament adopted with an overwhelming majority the controversial bill that would ban hijab and religious insignia in state schools, despite fierce opposition from the country’s sizable minorities and international rights groups.

France 's Minister for the Family Marie-Josee Roig told the committee Wednesday, June 2, the aim of the ban was to preserve total neutrality and equality in schools.

Intolerant To Muslims

On Wednesday, members of the committee sharply criticized the French law, which was adopted March 14 and is due to come into force in September, and told Roig it was intolerant to Muslims.

"In what way does a headscarf disturb a classroom?" Dutch committee member Jacob Egbert Doek asked Roig, adding that he regretted a lack of tolerance on the part of French authorities.

Fellow committee member Rosa Maria Ortiz said the law ran counter to the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, which stipulates that states must respect a child's right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

Egyptian colleague Mushira Khattab said it had raised the "fears of Muslim communities".

"What worries me is that this law plays into the hands of extremism and against minorities," she added.

Roig, for her part, explained that secular traditions in French state schools could not be isolated from values like respect for others and the state had a duty to guarantee equality for all pupils.

"It's the fruit of a long history and common values that are the foundations of national unity," Roig told the panel of 18 former judges, lawyers and academics.

"We want to continue to preserve total neutrality in our schools," she added.

The committee has this week been conducting a regular examination of the way France enforces the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which has been signed by France and 191 other countries.