Turkey’s anti-Gulen campaign goes global

James M. Dorsey, "Turkey’s anti-Gulen campaign goes global: 'Compliance with the Turkish demand would complicate already feeble Pakistani efforts'," yourmiddleeast.com

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Excerpt:

Estimates by government officials and non-governmental experts run the gamut, ranging from 25,000 to 88,000 madrassas or one to 50 percent of all educational institutions and one to 33 percent of all students in a country in which up to 50 percent of school-age children are not enrolled in an educational institution.

The one thing officials and experts do agree on is the fact that the majority of madrassas receive foreign funding, including substantial amounts from Saudi Arabia that often go to larger institutions. Funding from Saudi Arabia that adheres to Wahhabism, a puritan interpretation of Islam, is part of a decades-old public diplomacy campaign, the largest in history, that is designed to propagate ultra-conservative versions of the faith. ...