Habipoğlu: “Our right to mother-tongue education is being denied”
The Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) has strongly criticized a report published in the Greek newspaper Political on August 20, 2025.
The article claimed that criticisms in the Turkish press accusing Greece of violating the Lausanne Treaty were unfounded, arguing that the closure of schools was a nationwide measure due to low student numbers. It also asserted that the “Muslim minority in Greece lives in full freedom and equality.”
ABTTF President Halit Habipoğlu rejected the report, calling it “one-sided and lacking objectivity.” He stated:
“One of the most fundamental human rights of our children — the right to education in their mother tongue — is being denied. Meanwhile, in our homeland Türkiye, the request of the Greek Orthodox minority led to the opening of a Greek primary school in Gökçeada for just three students. While our primary schools are being closed in violation of our educational autonomy, while in Rhodope — where we are the majority — and in İskeçe — where we make up nearly half the population — we are denied the right to open bilingual Turkish minority kindergartens, and while our demand for a new building for the Turkish Minority Secondary and High School in Xanthi has been ignored for years, the claim that our community lives in full freedom and equality in Greece is nothing more than an attempt to cover up the facts.”
Habipoğlu further stressed that the implementation of the 2010 Ministry of Education decision on the special-status Turkish primary schools in Western Thrace constitutes a clear violation of the Lausanne Treaty.
