LETTER FROM ISTANBUL

Worried parents, school managements not speaking up, two foreign ministries in Germany and France preferring to remain silent, for fear of further antagonizing Ankara: Since the brutal decision, announced in the middle of the summer, by the Turkish Minister of National Education, Yusuf Tekin, to ban all new enrolments of Turkish or binational students in the country's two French schools and three German establishments, the foreign teaching community and its supervisory bodies are giving a disturbing feeling of unease and collective powerlessness.

The object of Turkish wrath? The demand for "reciprocity" that Ankara has been making for years, asking to open schools under Turkish law on French and German soil, following the example of the five French and German schools in Turkey. It is an issue that has constantly poisoned relations between the countries, and which Paris and Berlin have so far refused to address.

Earlier this year, rumors in the Turkish press suggested that the authorities intended to close these schools to Turkish students altogether. The French lycées Charles-de-Gaulle in Ankara and Pierre-Loti in Istanbul do not exist under Turkish law. Initially opened for the children of diplomats, these private schools are subject to French legislation. However, these schools, with some 2,400 students, today mainly cater to Turkish and binational secondary school students, like the German schools.

Following talks with the Turkish minister, the French embassy submitted a draft administrative agreement in the spring. Meetings and consultations were held at the academic and ministerial level. Then, at the beginning of July, the tone suddenly changed. "The Turkish side submitted a draft agreement that went beyond the proposals put forward up to now," stated the French embassy in a letter sent to parents at the time. This was followed by a "note verbale" from the Turkish authorities, in the form of an ultimatum.

A telling indication of the persistent deterioration in bilateral relations is the public reproaches made by Minister Tekin. On July 13, in an interview with the pro-government newspaper Habertürk, he condemned France's "arrogance," before losing his temper: "We are not like the countries you colonized. We are a sovereign state. If you want to teach here, you have to act on our terms."

A week later, a letter from the management of the Ernst-Reuter German School in Ankara, addressed to parents, stated that the Turkish Foreign Ministry had "unfortunately forbidden the acceptance of new students with Turkish passports, including dual nationals." The headline in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung read: "Conflict with Berlin: Turkey wants to push for its own schools in Germany."

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