Iraqi scraps free education

BAGHDAD, Sept 2 (AFP) -

Iraq, battered by 10 years of economic sanctions, is scrapping its free education system, and four million students will have to
begin paying, starting this month, a weekly newspaper reported Saturday.

The Education Ministry has set a scale of fees ranging from 2,000 dinars (one dollar) in primary schools and up to 25,000
dinars (12.50 dollars) for the coming academic year, reported Saut Al-Talaba (Students' Voice).

"It's a contribution from students to the efforts made by the government to maintain the level of edcuation under the sanctions
regime," which has been in force since Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, an Iraqi official told AFP under cover of anonymity.

It will be the first time in 30 years that Iraqis have been asked to pay for their education, although parents were asked to
provide school books and equipment for their children last year.

The measure has not been announced officially ahead of the new school year, which begins in mid-September and it was
unclear in the pro-government newspaper run by the student's union if university courses would also be affected.

Under sanctions, education standards have slipped in a country which boasted one of the best systems in the Arab world,
built on the back of the oil boom of the 1970s.

Attendance by both students and teachers has dropped dramatically as people struggle to eke out a living doing several jobs.

Teachers earn an average of 3,500 dinars a month, worth about 1.7 dollars at today's exchange rate. Before the Gulf War,
one Iraqi dinar was equivalent to 3.3 dollars.