Foundation set to apply for founding first Kurdish-language university

DİYARBAKIR – Anatolia News Agency

The legal procedures for 'Amed University' would be completed in about a month, Selim Ölçer said. AA photo

A Kurdish foundation has said that it had launched preparations to establish in Diyarbakır what would be Turkey’s first university to provide education in Kurdish. 

“Social sciences and faculties aiming at developing and spreading Kurdish languages will be [the university’s] priority,” Mesopotamia Foundation’s chairman Selim Ölçer explained, adding that the legal procedures would be completed in about a month. 

Following the completion of the required dossier, the foundation will have to apply to Turkey’s Higher Education Board (YÖK) to get the official go ahead. The foundation members have already visited Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç, who saw the project very positively and pledged the government’s support, Ölçer said. “[Arınç] told us that [the government] would spare no effort.”  

The Mesopotamia Foundation has 255 prestigious members, among whom the iconic Kurdish musician Şivan Perwer and renowned writer from Diyarbakır of Armenian descent, Mıgırdıç Margosyan. 

Ölçer also said that the university would likely be named “Amed”, the Kurdish name for Diyarbakır. “Our goal is to contribute to the Kurdish language and to provide education in the mother tongue as a human right,” he said.