Municipality removes Arabic signs to ‘remove visual pollution’ in Turkey’s south

HATAY

A municipality in southern Turkey has decided to remove all signs written in Arabic in order to “remove visual pollution,” according to its official Twitter account. 

The municipality of Hatay province shared photos of officials removing Arabic signs from several shops on May 21. 

“The removal process of the signs in Arabic, which create visual pollution, has started across Hatay,” the municipality stated. 

Turkey currently hosts around three million refugees, mostly from Syria, of whom around 384,000 live in Hatay, which is on the border with Syria. Many refugees have opened shops and have been putting up signs in Arabic to attract other Arabic-speaking customers. 

A similar practice was recently implemented in the southern province of Adana, where the local municipality removed Arabic signs “in order to protect Turkish language.”