Protests in Hasakah, Qamishlo reject reduction in Kurdish Language classes

Kurdish language teachers, along with students and their families, held two protest rallies today in Hasakah and Qamishlo in rejection of Syria’s Ministry of Education and Teaching Decision No. 964/2068, which allocates three weekly classes for teaching Kurdish.

In Hasakah, participants held banners reading, “There is no life without language,” “The Kurdish language is a right, existence and future,” and “I have the right to learn my mother tongue,” stressing that Kurdish is a fundamental part of their identity and existence.

The protesters chanted slogans affirming that “language is existence” and also sang the Kurdish national anthem, expressing their rejection of limiting Kurdish-language education to three classes per week.

Speaking at the Qamishlo protest, teacher Mezgin Hassan said parents reject the decision, questioning the legitimacy of imposing a decision requiring a new generation to study in Arabic after years of education in Kurdish. She also rejected the designation of Kurdish as an optional language.

She added that Kurdish has become a language of instruction in recent years, noting that various scientific and literary subjects have been taught in Kurdish in schools and universities. She called for Kurdish to be adopted as an official language of education and for this right to be enshrined in Syria’s new constitution.

Protesters in Hasakah and Qamishlo stressed that Kurdish is not merely a school subject, but a right, existence, identity and future. They called on the Ministry of Education and Teaching to reconsider the decision, guarantee students’ right to education in their mother tongue, and maintain the currently approved Kurdish-language curricula until a new constitution is adopted.

ANHA

QAMIŞLO

HESEKÊ