European Parliament Intergroup for Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Languages will discuss the shortcomings of minority education during the Strasbourg Plenary Session on 14 March 2013

Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) will give a presentation on education problems of Western Thrace Turkish minority during the plenary gathering of the European Parliament Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Language Intergroup on 14 March 2013. Human Rights Without Frontiers International (HRWF) Director Willy Fautré and Dr. Ali Hüseyinoğlu, specialist in minority rights will provide an insight on the minority education problems, in particular on the lack of bilingual kindergartens in Western Thrace.

The European Parliament Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Languages Intergroup aims to underline the minority rights’ being an essential part of the human rights and as a long term goal; to prepare ground for a minority protection mechanism to be issued on the EU-level. The Intergroup, composed of Members of the European Parliament, has shouldered the mission of alerting the European Commission on the situation and status of European minorities. ABTTF has, for the first time, given an introductory presentation about Western Thrace Turkish minority and its long-lasting problems on 17 November 2011.

HRWF Director Willy Fautré and Dr. Ali Huseyinoglu are to voice the problems Western Thrace Turkish minority encounters in having access to education in mother tongue

Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) President Halit Habipoğlu says “European Parliament Intergroup for Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Languages is a crucial instrument as for its composition and its orientation in bringing together the invaluable members of the European Parliament working on minority rights while providing the European minorities a unique platform to express their problems unequivocally. In charge of representation of the Western Thrace Turkish minority, ABTTF gave a presentation at the Intergroup for the first time on 17 November 2011 and thus, expressed the problems of the minority at the house of Europe. And now, more specifically and importantly enough, the minority’s problems in the field of education, precisely education in mother tongue and lack of bilingual kindergartens will be brought to the agenda. HRWF Director Willy Fautré and Dr. Ali Hüseyioğlu will share their expertise on the subject matter while addressing the shortcomings in bilingual preschool education the Western Thrace Turkish minority suffers from. Thus, the education issue and the lack of bilingual kindergartens, as being crucial and having urgency for a settlement, will be brought in their entirety to the attention of the members of the European Parliament”.