Even in war, schools not attacked: minister

ŞANLIURFA - Doğan News Agency

To attack schools one must not have any humanitarian values, Dinçer says. DHA Photo

Education Minister Ömer Dinçer has reacted harshly to attacks on schools in the southeast conducted recently by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

“They are in a desperate situation. Even in an open war hospitals, schools and mosques are not attacked. In particular, schools are never attacked by anyone. In schools, there are children and innocent people inside,” Dinçer said during a speech given on the occasion of the opening of the academic year at Harran University in the southeastern province of Şanlıurfa.

To attack schools or hospitals one must not have any humanitarian values, Dinçer said, severely condemning those who carried out the latest attacks but praising those parents, teachers and students who protected their schools.

“As you can see, parents, teachers and students all together resisted these attacks. In Şemdinli in Hakkari, parents protested the torching of the school. In Diyarbakır, teachers stopped the attackers.

We are taking security measures as much as we can. I believe we will overcome this problem with contributions from parents, teachers, administrators and students,” he said.

Meanwhile, two containers that were being used as classrooms in the yard of the Mehmet Akif Ersoy High School in the eastern province of Van’s Erek district were torched by PKK supporters on the evening of Oct. 10. Molotov cocktails were thrown at the containers around 10 p.m, destroying the containers as well as the educational materials inside them. Police have started searching for the perpetrators.

In addition, two suspects under arrest on charges of burning four hectares of pine forest one year ago in the Aegean province of İzmir’s Foça district in support of the PKK, 20-year-old Seyfettin Turan and 21-year-old Ferhat Yaşar, have been sentenced to life imprisonment and each been given a 16,660 Turkish Lira fine.