Kurdish pupils denied language lessons in Turkey amid wider curbs, families say

4/12/2024 16:53

        A Turkish government proposal to end a decades-long conflict with Kurdish militants has put Kurdish rights back in the spotlight, at a time when Kurdish leaders say repression is rife and freedoms won more than a decade ago have eroded.
        
        One of those is the right to receive two hours of Kurdish language education in school, a move introduced by Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan in 2012 as an "historic step" in a country which once banned the Kurdish language outright.
        
        More than a dozen parents, Kurdish politicians and education experts told Reuters their children today could not receive the language classes even in Turkey's largest cities, and not all Kurdish families knew of the right to ask for them.
        
        Turkey's Kurds make up about a fifth of the population, numbering an estimated 17 million. Kurdish is the mother tongue for most and the right to education in Kurdish is one of their main demands.
        
        The constitution however states, "no language other than Turkish shall be taught as mother tongue to Turkish citizens."