The witch hunt for Academics for Peace continues: Two more faculty members fired

The witch hunt against the academics who signed the Petition for Peace, which demanded from the Turkish government to stop the violence perpetrated by the forces of the Turkish state in the Kurdish provinces of Turkey, continues. Two more signatories lost their jobs this week.

According to the Turkish daily Cumhuriyet, Assistant Professor Aslı Vatansever and Professor Serdar Değirmencioğlu were fired by Doğuş University in Istanbul. Vatansever stated that the university had opened three disciplinary investigations against her: one for signing the Petition for Peace, another for reading the press release of the Academics for Peace in Sur, and the third for posting a slogan from the German student movement of 1968 on her office door. Vatansever added that she does not regret her signature at all. She hopes that the Academics for Peace will provide the occasion to build a new academia in Turkey.