Syrian refugee teachers in Iraqi Kurdistan: one year with no salary
ERBIL, KRG, Iraq (north Press) – On Saturday, Hassan Qasim, head of the Union of Syrian Kurdistan Teachers in the Kurdistan Region, revealed that Syrian refugee teachers in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRG) have struggled to receive their salaries on a regular basis.
More than a thousand teachers among the Syrian refugees in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq are suffering due to not receiving their salaries for about a year.
Qasim told North Press, “The Foundation for the Support of Women and Child Rights in the Middle East has obtained funding from the European Union and the Gulf Fund for Support.”
He added, “we have not reached an agreement with the Ministry of Education of KRG to arrange the delivery of this funding to teachers until now, and there is no other solution in sight.”
In the Kurdistan Region, there are 1,200 Syrian refugee teachers, some of whom have not received salaries for nine months, and others for a year.
At the end of 2019, UNICEF and other international organizations stopped providing funding to these teachers under the pretext of the longevity of the Syrian crisis.
Several meetings have been conducted by the Teachers Union, as Qasim says: “We met with the Minister of Education and obtained the approval of the Council of Ministers to finance the educational process for Syrian refugees.”
In the Kurdistan Region there are fifty-eight schools in which forty thousand students study in the various regions of the KRG and ten camps for Syrian refugees.
As a result of the agreement with the Ministry of Education, only two salaries were secured, according to Qasim.
Qasim added, “Two months’ salary was paid for the new school year, and some teachers have not received their salaries for more than a year.”
The Syrian Kurdistan Teachers Union was established in 2015 as a body working to secure the rights of Syrian refugee teachers.