NEWS

Athens fires back over Ankara’s minority rights accusation

Athens fires back over Ankara’s minority rights accusation

Greece and Turkey exchanged criticisms over minority rights on Wednesday with Athens saying that it is "paradoxical, if not funny” for Turkey to lecture Greece about the need to respect minority rights.

“History will forever be the most objective witness to the systematic way in which Turkey has eliminated all the minorities in its territory during the twentieth century,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement, responding to Ankara’s claim that Greece is oppressing the members of its Muslim community in western Thrace.

“Specifically for the Muslim minority, we must note that there are 115 minority primary schools in the area, within which the education provided fully guarantees all the rights of the students,” the ministry continued.

It also noted that Istanbul in 1955 had 54 Greek primary schools, while today there are only 3.

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