The United Nations (UN) Committee on the Rights of the Child published its concluding observations on our country Greece, which it examined at its 90th session between 3 May and 3 June 2022.
In the concluding observations, which include recommendations for our country, which is a party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, it is noted that the Committee is concerned about the ongoing discrimination and negative attitudes towards children belonging to the Turkish community in Western Thrace, which affects the children’s access to education and restricts their access to socio-economic rights and services.
The Committee recommends that our country ensure that the Turkish community in Western Thrace has an adequate number of bilingual schools with Greek and Turkish curricula and that quality education is provided there, and that children belonging to the Turkish community in Western Thrace receive quality education in their mother tongue Turkish alongside the official language Greek in accordance with Articles 2, 14, 29 and 30 of the Convention.
Calling on our country to allocate adequate financial, human and technical resources for the development of the scope and capacity of pre-school education, the Committee recommends the provision of a sufficient number of bilingual kindergartens for the Turkish community in Western Thrace.
Noting the important role of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the provision of services to children, the Committee advises our country to intensify cooperation with NGOs representing children belonging to the Turkish community in Western Thrace and to meaningfully involve them in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of policies, programmes and laws related to children’s rights.
The Committee also recommends that our country’s National Council Against Racism and Intolerance publicise the work to the public and ensure that NGOs representing children from the Turkish community in Western Thrace are represented in the aforementioned council.
On the other hand, the Committee expresses deep concern over our country’s policy of detaining child migrants on the grounds of identification and calls on our country to immediately end the detention of migrant children and to ensure the transfer of children seeking asylum and their families out of detention centres.
The Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) prepared a parallel report on the combined periodic report of our country for the fourth, fifth and sixth periods which was prestend to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and submitted its parallel report to the Committee in recent months, detailing the issues encountered by the children belonging to the Turkish Community in Western Thrace in the field of education.
Please click here for the concluding observations of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child regarding Greece:
https://tbinternet.ohchr.org/Treaties/CRC/Shared%20Documents/GRC/CRC_C_GRC_CO_4-6_48924_E.pdf
