Turkey restricts French studies at University amid Qur’an controversy

Ankara: Amid political controversy between Ankara and Paris over ‘French figures calling for the removal of parts of Qur’an’, Turkey has suspended providing French literature studies in Turkish university, said a report by Xinhua.

However, according to Turkey’s Council of Higher Education (YOK), another reason for the move is a low employment of graduates in teaching departments and a lack of reciprocity.

“We have condemned the controversial statements on the Quran coming from France. And the Higher Education Board, which is an autonomous institution, made this move as a response to those statements,” said Emrullah Isler, chairman of the Committee on National Education, Culture, Youth and Sport in the Turkish parliament, Al-Jazeera reported.

Also Read: ‘Who are you to attack our scriptures?’: Erdogan slams French manifesto targeting holy Quran

“Lack of university departments in France that teach in Turkish is another factor behind the decision. They need to form decent Turkology departments there. Plus, there have been too many departments teaching in the French language in Turkish universities,” Isler said.

Qur’an row:

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had denounced the open letter, dated April 22 in French newspaper Le Parisien that was signed by nearly 300 prominent French figures, who called for removing certain parts of Qur’an that according to them talk about violence. The letter said, “Murder and punishment of Jews, Christians and disbelievers” should be removed from the book, calling them “obsolete”. Responding to this, Erdogan said: “The West! As you keep on attacking our holy book, you should know that we will not attack your sacred but we will overthrow you.”

“Have they ever read their books, the Bible? Or the Torah? If they had read them, they probably would want to ban the Bible,” Erdogan said.