Turkey Plans to Reopen All Schools as Long as Virus Keeps Receding

Seagulls in front of the Maiden's Tower in Istanbul on April 8, 2020 (AFP)
Seagulls in front of the Maiden's Tower in Istanbul on April 8, 2020 (AFP)
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Turkey Plans to Reopen All Schools as Long as Virus Keeps Receding

Seagulls in front of the Maiden's Tower in Istanbul on April 8, 2020 (AFP)
Seagulls in front of the Maiden's Tower in Istanbul on April 8, 2020 (AFP)

Turkey plans to reopen schools nationwide on Aug. 31, to get students back into classrooms and free up working parents, assuming a recent stabilization in coronavirus cases holds.

Teachers and administrators are preparing on-site health precautions, but two government sources told Reuters that the daily infection rate may need to dip below the more than 900 seen recently to allow them to execute what they called Plan A.

Schools shifted to distance education in March, when Turkey identified its first case and began restricting movement.

Much of the economy reopened on June 1, after the school year ended, but masks and other hygiene measures are still required in public.

“We have been told that the schools will reopen, so we will see how it goes,” said a first-grade teacher in the southern city of Antalya. “I do feel a bit concerned about my students’ and my family’s health, of course.”

About half of Turkey’s nearly 230,000 cases and more than 5,600 deaths are in its biggest city, Istanbul, the government says. The capital Ankara and Diyarbakir in the mainly Kurdish southeast have also been hotspots.

One government source said that “if the number of cases decreases, all schools will be opened”, but that otherwise schools in high-infection areas might remain closed.

A second senior official said classes might have to remain online for some southeastern provinces. “The normalization is under way ... but the numbers should have fallen faster.”

A primary school teacher based in the southeast said some of her students had not had the means to attend online classes, adding: “Online teaching can never be as efficient as classroom learning.”

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his cabinet will make a final decision late next month based on the spread of infection and advice from scientists, the officials said.

Turkey's economy virtually stagnated in the second quarter and is expected to shrink this year.



Spain Rejects NATO’s Anticipated Defense Spending Increase as 'Unreasonable'

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez speaks during a press conference at the Spanish Embassy in Beijing, April 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez speaks during a press conference at the Spanish Embassy in Beijing, April 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
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Spain Rejects NATO’s Anticipated Defense Spending Increase as 'Unreasonable'

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez speaks during a press conference at the Spanish Embassy in Beijing, April 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez speaks during a press conference at the Spanish Embassy in Beijing, April 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)

Spain has rejected a NATO proposal to spend 5% of GDP on defense needs that’s due to be announced next week, calling it “unreasonable.”

In a letter sent Thursday to NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said that Spain “cannot commit to a specific spending target in terms of GDP” at next week’s NATO summit in The Hague.

Most US allies at NATO are on track to endorse US President Donald Trump’s demand that they invest 5% of gross domestic product on their defense and military needs. In early June, Sweden and the Netherlands said that they aim to meet the new target, The AP news reported.

Spain was the lowest spender in the 32-nation military alliance last year, directing less than 2% of its GDP on defense expenditure.

In April, Sánchez said the government would raise defense spending by 10.5 billion euros ($12 billion) in 2025 to reach NATO’s previous target of 2% of GDP.

After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, NATO’s 32 allies agreed to spend at least 2% of GDP on their military budgets. But NATO plans for defending Europe and North America against a Russian attack require investment of at least 3%.

The aim now is to raise the bar to 3.5% for core defense spending on tanks, warplanes, air defense, missiles and hiring extra troops. A further 1.5% would be spent on things like roads, bridges, ports and airfields so armies can deploy more quickly, as well as preparing societies for possible attack.

Rutte had been due to table a new proposal on Friday aimed at satisfying Spain. European allies and Canada are keen to finalize the spending pledge before the summit, and not leave it open for any heated debate that might drag the meeting out. Poland and the Baltic countries — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — have already publicly committed to 5%, and Rutte has said that most allies were ready to endorse the goal.

A big question still to be answered is what time-frame countries will get to reach the new spending goals. A target date of 2032 was initially floated, but Rutte has said that Russia could be ready to launch an attack on NATO territory by 2030.