U.S. English Foundation Research
TURKEY
Language Research
4. Minority groups: To what extent are minority groups in this country disadvantaged by their language?
Until as recently as 1991 it was illegal to speak Kurdish in Turkey even in private. Although the language ban has been lifted, various legal restrictions on the expression of minority identity remain in Turkey. Use of Kurdish is now allowed in informal settings, but it remains outlawed in schools and cannot be used in political settings or in broadcasts other than music.
The issue is extremely sensitive, and the Turkish government for years has claimed that expressions of Kurdish identity were veiled attempts to break up the State. Conversely, Turkey's officially recognized Greek, Armenian and Jewish minorities are allowed schools in their own languages.
The legal framework still lags far behind developments in society. Recognizing this, successive governments since 1990 have sought to liberalize laws that are used to punish free expression. However, they have neglected to address the underlying rationale for creating such legislation in the first place.
In 1991, the government repealed a law passed in 1983 that prohibited the use of Kurdish (Law No. 2932) and also broke down the taboo on debating the Kurdish issue in public. That effort, combined with the introduction of private television, spawned a raucous and largely unlimited debate on the Kurdish question that lasted through 1993.
In place of these laws, however, the government passed the Anti-Terror Law. Articles 7 and 8 of that law were often used to punish free expression dealing with the Kurdish question. Although Turkey softened the Anti-Terror Law in 1995 and eased some restrictive articles of the constitution the same year, further attempts at liberalization regarding the Kurdish question fell victim to the escalating violence. Laws still exist that prevent broadcasting in Kurdish, teaching Kurdish in private or state schools, and using Kurdish in political campaigns.
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Updated (May 2004)
THE TURKISH GOVERNMENT CRITICIZED BY ETHNIC MINORITIES
The Kurdish and Armenian minorities in Turkey have criticized the government for inability to implement the policy of human and minority rights' improvement. This policy was devised to secure Turkey's early entry into the European Union.
However, the reports on continuing activities against the Kurdish community, including military raids on villages and the forced displacement of villagers in 2003, have led community representatives to question the government's commitments in this matter.
According to a representative of the Contemporary Lawyers Association of Diyarbakýr Branch, the basic legally binding treaty regarding minority protection in Turkey is the Lausanne Peace Treaty; however, the Kurds are not recognized as a minority under this Treaty. Turkey's desire to be part of the European Union has encouraged the government to pass several legal reforms within the framework of harmonization with the Copenhagen Political Criteria, including the Constitutional Reform (October 2001) and the adoption of a new Civil Code (November 2001).
Despite legalization of broadcasting in Kurdish in 2002, significant restrictions remain in the second Regulation on the Language of Radio and Television Broadcasts, which ban broadcasts for children and those aimed at teaching languages other than Turkish.
Since September 2003, the Kurds have been officially allowed to take Kurdish names, previously prohibited under the Turkish law. However, their names may not use the letters like x, w or q, which are common in Kurdish but do not exist in the Turkish version of the Latin alphabet1.
Recommendations by the Contemporary Lawyers Association to the Turkish government also highlighted the need for mother tongue education at primary and secondary level (teaching of the Kurdish language should be allowed at all levels).
They also called for changes to the restrictive electoral system making it easier for minorities to be represented in Parliament by removing the 10 percent threshold required for it.
Source: Minority Rights Group, March 15, 2004, http://www.minorityrights.org/news_detail.asp?ID=234. (Click here to download the full intervention delivered to the UN Working Group on Minorities)
1 These letters are often used in Turkey in the names of companies, TV and radio channels, and trademarks.
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Updated (October 2004)
SITUATION OF MINORITIES IN TURKEY
EDUCATION
Article 42 of the Turkish Constitution states:
No language other than Turkish shall be taught as a mother tongue to Turkish citizens at any institutions of training or education, . . . foreign language education will be determined by law.
Article 3 states that the language of Turkey is Turkish.
These Articles have been used to prevent any minority language education, private or public (with the exception of those minorities recognized under the Lausanne Treaty). Circassions, Kurds and Laz have requested and been repeatedly denied either schools teaching in their respective language, or simply their language being an optional subject in areas where they are a numerical majority. There are no language or literature departments in these minorities' languages at any university in Turkey.
Article 40 of the Lausanne Treaty states that non-Muslim minorities shall have the right to establish, manage and control, at their own expense, any schools and other establishments for instruction and education, with the right to use their own language therein. This article gave the Armenian and Greek minorities the right to establish primary, secondary and high schools teaching in their languages. However, in practice, restrictions have been placed on these, particularly Greek-language teachers are in short supply. The approval of Armenian and Greek school textbooks is also long and complicated. The Syriac minority has not benefited from the Lausanne Treaty's protection, despite their requests to be allowed to set up schools.
Nevertheless the Constitution has not prevented some private and state educational establishments to teach in English and French. For example, the Galatasaray High School uses French, and the Middle East Technical University (ODTU), the Boðaziçi University and some private universities use English.
The Foreign Language Education and Teaching Law, amended on August 9, 2002, has made significant progress in this situation. This law and the regulation on its implementation theoretically facilitate learning of different languages and dialects used traditionally by Turkish citizens in their daily lives. However, the law still does not explicitly protect the language rights of minorities and it is hedged about with many restrictions on teaching including the following clause:
. . . such courses cannot be against the fundamental principles of the Turkish Republic enshrined in the Constitution and the indivisible integrity of the state with its territory and nation.
These restrictions do not apply to education in English or French.
POLITICAL PARTIES AND REPRESENTATION IN THE PARLIAMENT
Under the Turkish electoral system, political parties must gain at least 10 percent of the national vote to enter the Parliament1. This high threshold, (the highest recorded by the OSCE), discriminates particularly against Kurdish parties, which are largely regionally based and have strong support in their community. Although the pro-Kurdish political party DEHAP (Democracy Party) got more than 6 percent of the total national vote in the last general elections in November 2003 (and more than 45 percent in the five largely Kurdish provinces), they have no seats in the Parliament.
There are significant provisions in Turkish law prohibiting political activities based on or demanding minority rights. Article 81 of the Law on Political Parties (Law No. 2820, adopted on April 26, 1982) on the Prevention of the Creation of Minorities prohibits political parties from claiming that minorities exist in the Turkish Republic based on national, religious, confessional, and racial or language differences.
PROHIBITION TO USE MINORITY LANGUAGES IN POLITICAL ACTIVITIES
The Law on Political Parties attempts to prevent the use of minority language in politics. Article 81(b) of the Law prohibits using a language other than Turkish:
in writing and printing party statutes or programs; at congresses; at meetings in open air or indoor gatherings; at meetings and in propaganda; in placards; picture, phonograph records; voice and visual tapes; brochures and statements.
However, the article allows the translation of party statutes and programs into foreign languages other than those forbidden by the law. This restriction distinguishes between foreign and minority languages, and it is particularly discriminatory against pro-Kurdish parties, whose voters often do not speak Turkish.
The Ankara State Security Court opened an investigation against thirteen executive board members of the HAK-PAR, a pro-Kurdish political party, for speaking in Kurdish during their party congress, using posters written in Kurdish and sending invitations in Kurdish to the President of Turkey. The President of DEHAP was investigated for saying "goodbye" in Kurdish during an election meeting.
Another restrictive clause is Article 58 of the Law Concerning Fundamental Provisions on Elections and Voter Registries (Law No. 298, adopted on April 26, 1961) forbidding the use of languages other than Turkish in propaganda disseminated via radio or television as well as in other election propaganda.
Source: Minority Rights Group International, Minorities in Turkey, Submission to the European Union and the Government of Turkey, July 2004, http://www.minorityrights.org/admin/download/pdf/MRG-TurkeySub.pdf
1 Only two political parties sit in the current parliament; the government's Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the People's Republican Party.
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Updated (October 2006)
TURKEY CONTINUES TO PRACTICE A POLICY OF "TURKIFICATION"
According to a briefing paper issued by the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF), despite some positive developments in the past few years, Turkey's protection of minority groups continues to fall seriously short of European and other international standards. Their policy is characterized by the failure to recognize the mere existence of most minorities, by prosecution of people who speak about minorities or historical facts about them, and by the reluctance to solve basic problems faced by minorities.
Turkey continues to practice the policy of "Turkification," adopted in the early 20th century. This policy amounts to a form of cultural assimilation that fails to recognize individuals' rights to ethnic, national, and religious self-identification, and that aims at forced assimilation with the Turkish identity. It encompasses several strategies that violate, in one way or another, internationally guaranteed standards for minority rights. These strategies still include: denying formal recognition of minority groups; hindering their access to the media; limiting their political participation; violating their freedom of expression (especially in their own language); impeding their freedom of religion; refraining from facilitating their freedom of movement and to choose their place of residence; and practicing or tolerating various other forms of direct and indirect discrimination.
Turkey bases its minority policies on the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne and claims to be bound only by this treaty which itself is obsolete in light of current international standards for minority rights and protection. Moreover, while the treaty provides for protection for all non-Muslim minorities, all Turkish governments have interpreted the treaty to guarantee protection only to three minority groups: the Armenian Orthodox Christians, the Greek Orthodox Christians, and the Jews. What is more, these groups are recognized only as religious minorities - not as ethnic.
Turkey has no laws in force specifically addressing minority issues, a lot of laws are misused against individuals who have sought to promote minority rights, or even to address the existence of minorities. These include inter alia the Penal Code, anti-terrorism legislation and laws regulating the operation political parties and other associations.
For example, addressing the issue of discrimination against minorities, the largest teachers' union, Egitim Sen, was closed down in 2005 for defending the right to education in children's mother tongues. In addition, the formal closure of the pro-Kurdish DEHAP and HAK-PAR parties are pending in the Constitutional Court for "creating minorities" and using prohibited languages in election activities.
At present, both recognized and non-recognized minorities face serious problems with respect to the right to education in one’s own language. The legal reforms of the past few years have lifted some restrictions on instruction of minority languages, and on the ban on broadcasting in some minority languages, but under many conditions and only in a few languages. The instruction of minority language is legal only in private educational institutions and under strict conditions. Non-Muslim religious minorities have encountered problems in applying the principles of article 40 of the Lausanne Treaty regarding language education, which states that non-Muslim minorities should have the "equal right to establish, manage and control at their own expense […] any schools and other establishments for instruction and education, with the rights to use their own language."
In reality, however, the proper functioning of minority schools is hindered in several ways. Firstly, minorities still encounter problems obtaining teaching materials or in getting those teaching materials approved. Secondly, minorities are suffering from state restrictions on minority teachers.
Thus, for example, Greek minority teachers are restricted to schools where they can teach and they must have Turkish citizenship. Similarly, the training of Armenian language teachers is very limited, possibly pending acceptance by the Turkish authorities of the Armenian Department within the Istanbul University for the study of the Armenian language.
Another example are the Circassians who appear to have lost – among other bits of cultural identity – their language, as their younger generations no longer speak it. Yet, because of Turkey's policies on hindering minority languages, it is most difficult for Turkey’s Circassians to rescue their language. Circassians themselves insist that permission to give private language courses is not sufficient to save the language. According to them, it would help if the Turkish government supported the opening of Circassian language schools.
The Laz are also suffering from Turkey's policies of assimilation in terms of language restrictions. Whereas Turkey approved the broadcasting of programs in minority languages in 2002 - a move which resembled more a symbolic gesture toward the EU than a genuine reform in favor of its minorities - it only authorized the broadcasting of the programs in five minority languages: the two Kurdish dialects of Zaza and Kurmanci, Arabic, Bosnian, and Circassian. The Laz language was not authorized. Then, in 2004, the state sanctioned a daily program called "Our Cultural Richness" on TRT-INT, the national television, but still excluded the Laz language. This practice is in violation of Section III, article 39 of the Lausanne Treaty, which "guarantees all citizens of Turkey the right to use any language in press and publications of any kind."
The limitation in the use of the Kurdish language amounts to the limitation of the Kurds’ freedom of expression. While some progress has been made in language rights - for example, letters that appear in the Kurdish alphabet but not in the Turkish one are no longer banned from print - Turkish authorities still continue to hinder the Kurds from using their language when it may reflect some ethnic pride. For example, a specific law prevents the use of minority language in politics. The Law on Political Parties prohibits using a language other than Turkish “in writing and printing party statutes or programs; at congresses, at meetings in open air or indoor gatherings; at meetings and in propaganda; in placards, picture, phonograph records, voice and visual tapes, brochures and statements."
In light of the many violations of internationally accepted standards for minority rights and protection, the IHF recommends to the government of Turkey, among other measures, to promptly reform its official minority policy so as to reflect the actual existence of minorities in Turkey, and to officially recognize all ethnic and religious minorities and provide them the support and protection guaranteed by the international human rights instruments Turkey is party to.
Source: The Minelres Archives, "Turkey: A Minority Policy of Systematic Negation" (a briefing paper issued by IHF), October 10, 2006 http://lists.delfi.lv/pipermail/minelres/2006-October/004826.html
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Updated (August 2007)
MAYORS WHO ALLOWED THE USE OF KURDISH AND OTHER LANGUAGES IN OFFICE RISK JAIL
Prosecutors are seeking jail terms of up to three years for two mayors and seventeen council members in southeastern Turkey who introduced Kurdish and other languages in administration.
The accused include Osman Baydemir, mayor of the city of Diyarbakir, and Abdullah Demirbaş, who was removed from his post as mayor of Diyarbakir's multi–ethnic Sur municipality last month after the city council in January 2007 allowed the use of Kurdish, Armenian, Arabic, Assyrian and English in municipal services. The trial of the two mayors and the seventeen city–councilmen who voted for the municipal bill is scheduled to begin in November.
According to the Constitution, Turkish is the sole official language and no other languages can be used in government offices and municipalities. Even though the state officials have in recent years legalized broadcasts in Kurdish and allowed private institutions to teach the Kurdish language, the law still requires Kurds to use only Turkish in official communication and politics.
Source: Turkish Daily News, July 31, 2007 http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=79681
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Updated (July 2008)
DEMIRTAS DOES NOT WANT TO GIVE UP
The local mayor in the city of Diyarbakir, Abdullah Demirtas, who started offering services in different languages and was dismissed earlier this year, is still charged with violating the law.
The 41-year-old former teacher says he won the election by a landslide, giving him a mandate to keep his promise to make his mayoral term more accessible to his electorate by speaking Kurdish. By keeping his promise, he also brought about his downfall.
Although the law officially banning the language was struck down in 1991, Kurds still face legal restrictions over the use of their language.
“When I was elected, I ordered a survey of the people,” he says. “The overwhelming majority asked for services in their mother tongues – in numbers it was 72 percent Kurdish, 24 percent Turkish and two percent Arabic. Consequently, I ordered that all information about training and services be made available in those languages. The Interior Minister however said this was illegal as Turkish is the only official language and I was dismissed. Consequently, the authorities have started 20 cases against me for publications in Kurdish.”
Demirtas is back in his office working hard to help former constituents, who still come to him. He is also planning to run again in next year's mayor election to fulfill the commitment he made to the voters to serve them in their own languages.
“It breaks my heart,” he continues, “that all my life, I have been told that I am a Turk and my mother tongue is Turkish. To deny this, he says means being called a terrorist, something he does not accept. The country must embrace its diversity which he says, is Turkey's strength and not its weakness.”
Balancing the fear that greater cultural rights could ultimately lead to the disintegration of the Turkish state versus Kurdish demands for full recognition of their cultural identity, is the conundrum faced by all Turkish governments since the formation of the republic 85 years ago. Experts say until that balance is found, permanent peace in the predominantly Kurdish southeast will continue to remain illusive.
Some steps have been taken to loosen the controls over the use of the Kurdish language. As Turkey tries to enter the European Union, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Kurdish broadcasting is to be extended to 24 hours. However, this government, like its predecessors, remains strongly opposed to the official use of Kurdish.
Source: Voice of America, News, July 24, 2008 by Dorian Jones http://www.voanews.com/english/2008-07-24-voa46.cfm
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