Iraqi teachers strike for educational reform

By Ali Jawad

BAGHDAD

Iraqi teachers launched a two-day strike nationwide on Sunday to demand financial benefits and educational reform.

"Teachers have joined the strike in most provinces," Yassin Mohammed, a member of the Iraqi Teachers Union, told Anadolu Agency.

He cited educational decline and curriculum reform as among the reasons for staging the protest.

"The government has also failed to grant the teachers their rights to housing and other privileges that other civil servants enjoy," he said.

Over the past months, hundreds of Iraqi teachers staged protests in several provinces to demand the federal government pay their arrears and stop salary deductions.