Students protest Kurdish-language restrictions

The cities of Hasakah and Derbasiyah witnessed student protests today, Tuesday, against the decision to limit Kurdish-language instruction to just three lessons per week. The participants called for their right to learn in their mother tongue to be guaranteed and for its presence in educational institutions to be strengthened.

In Hasakah, dozens of students staged a protest both outside and inside the Directorate of Education building, expressing their rejection of recent executive decisions concerning changes to the Kurdish-language curricula and reductions in the number of lessons allocated to it. They said the measures infringed on their educational rights, after they had spent years studying in their mother tongue.

The protesters called for the decision to be reconsidered and rejected limiting Kurdish-language education to a small number of lessons. They stressed the need for Kurdish to receive constitutional recognition and be included in the official curriculum as a fundamental pillar of education, rather than as a secondary or optional subject.

In the city of Derbasiyah, students staged a march along the main street before heading to the city's educational complex, chanting slogans calling for the preservation of the Kurdish language and an increase in the number of lessons allocated to teaching it.

The participants affirmed the right of all components to receive education in their mother tongues. They called for Kurdish to be adopted as the primary language of instruction, in a move that would protect cultural and linguistic identity and safeguard future generations' right to learn their language.

ANHA