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Import of Georgian Text-Books to Azerbaijan Is Banned

September 27, 2011

Gela Mtivlishvili, Kakheti

In the morning of September 26, an incident occurred on Georgian-Azerbaijan border. Azerbaijan border officers seized Georgian text-books from Elinata Saparova, teacher of the Georgian sector of Aliabadi village public school in Zakatala district.

Azerbaijan border officers seized Georgian text-books – 54 copies of Math text-books and Georgian work-books – from teacher. The teacher said the incident aims to close up Georgian sector in the local school due to lack of Georgian text-books.

Georgian MP, deputy chair of Human Rights and Civil Integration Committee Dimitry Lortkipanidze responded to the incident yesterday. He suggested the Foreign Ministry of Georgia to promptly respond to the fact.

Deputy foreign minister Davit Jalagania said the Ministry did not have information about the incident. “We will inquire the information about this incident because we, together with other governmental institutions, are responsible to protect our citizens’ rights. Corresponding agencies will update us with detailed information and relatively we will address to the issue,” said Jalagania.

It is noteworthy that most residents of Kakhi and Zaqatala districts do not have Georgian citizenship. 

Georgian schools in Kakhi and Zaqatala districts were searched soon after the incident on the border. ICK’s correspondent in Saingilo reported that as a result of search security officers removed more than 200 Georgian text-books from school.

“The search started at 11:00 am. They entered every classroom together with the school directors and took Georgian text-books from pupils’ bags. Afterwards, the school directors were summoned to the security service department,” the ICK’s correspondent reported from Saingilo.

He got in touch with the administration of the Kakhingilo village secondary school in Kakhi district who denied information about the search. However, parents of the pupils confirmed that Georgian text-books were seized from their children. “It is not first fact. Several days ago they visited school and took Georgian language text-book from my child. We hardly manage to transport books across the border; Azerbaijan border officers prohibit us to bring them here. We informed the Ministry of Education of Georgia and Georgian Embassy in Azerbaijan about the fact but nobody paid attention to us,” said a parent.

Head of Public Relation Department of the Georgian Ministry of Education and Science Nino Protjebskaya said the Ministry does not have information about the incident on the Georgian-Azerbaijan border. “Saingilo based Georgian schools do not subordinate to the Georgian Ministry of Education and Science. They purchase Georgian text-books based on their own decision and take them to Azerbaijan. We are not involved in this process,” said Protjebskaya, who added that the Ministry was noted about the incident neither today nor yesterday.

Ali Babaev, head of non-governmental organization Georgia Is My Homeland, told the newspaper “Resonance” that according to the agreement between Georgia and Azerbaijan, transportation of text-books across the border and teaching pupils with those text-books in Azerbaijani based Georgian schools is prohibited.

He added that as a result of negotiations between the minister, Georgian and Azerbaijan authorities decided to ban transportation of Azerbaijan text-books to Georgia based Azerbaijan schools and of Georgian text-books to Azerbaijan based Georgian schools.

“Azerbaijan authority translated text-books in Georgian and now distributes them among pupils. The import of Georgian books is prohibited. The books published in Georgia do not comply with the Azerbaijan system of education. So they instructed to ban import of all kind text-books to Azerbaijan. Although Azerbaijan authority translated text-books for Georgian sectors, the problem exists in Georgia based Azerbaijan schools because Georgian authority cannot supply Azerbaijan schools with Azerbaijan text-books. I will have discussion about this problem in Baku,” said Ali Babaev.

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