GCPEA News
Alleged PKK members attack schools in Turkey
Euronews, October 23, 2012
Suspected members of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party have stepped up their campaign of attacking schools in Turkey’s southeast.
On Monday, militants entered a school in the Van province and threw firebombs. Three people were injured.
The building was left gutted and pupils have been sent home until further notice.
Over the past two weeks, more than 20 schools have been torched by PKK sympathisers.
The group wants to carve out a Kurdish state in that part of the country.
It says it sees Turkish educational institutions as an instrument to assimilate Kurdish children.
On October 17, the group kidnapped six primary school teachers in an Igdir village before releasing them an hour later.
The PKK took up arms 28 years ago and is listed as a terrorist organisation by the EU and the US.
The conflict has claimed at least 40,000 lives.
