President Ahmet Necdet Sezer warned Turkey's new government on Sunday against lifting a ban on wearing the Islamic-style headscarf in public offices, saying such a move would threaten the country's secularism.
The remarks highlighted friction between Sezer and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which traces its roots to two parties banned for Islamic fundamentalism, in a Muslim nation that strictly separates state and religion.
Prime Minister Abdullah Gul, whose wife covers her hair, has said he would work to lift a ban on women wearing headscarves in universities and state offices, but that it was not a top priority for the new administration.
"It benefits no one for the headscarf issue, which has reappeared on the agenda, to create problems again," Sezer said in comments carried by local television.
"Allowing the headscarf in public-sector areas is impossible because it is unconstitutional... (Wearing) the headscarf in the private sphere is a freedom, but Constitutional Court decisions have already solved the issue of whether it is acceptable or not in the public sphere," he said.
Secularists like Sezer and the influential military see the headscarf as an Islamist challenge in Turkey, a candidate for European Union membership as well as being a NATO member and close ally of the United States.
Turkey's generals, self-proclaimed guardians of the secular order, pressured the first Islamist-led government to quit in 1997 for what they saw as a dangerous tilt towards religious law.
The AKP, which won a landslide victory in November 3 elections, has fought off the Islamist label and says it is a conservative and secular party.
Gul has said he sees the headscarf issue as a matter of religious freedom. His government has pledged to expand political and human rights in order to meet EU criteria.