Turkey has barred outdoor giant-screen broadcasts of the national football team’s World Cup match against Paraguay to limit noise and traffic before a university entrance exam to be taken by more than 2.4 million people.
Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftçi instructed governors in all 81 provinces not to allow the match to be shown on giant screens in streets and public squares.
Municipalities in several cities, including İzmir, Samsun, Denizli and Uşak, subsequently canceled planned outdoor screenings.
Turkey’s Group D match against Paraguay is scheduled to begin at 6 a.m. Saturday in Turkey. The first session of the Higher Education Institutions Examination begins at 10:15 a.m.
Authorities said crowds gathering to watch the match could create noise and traffic congestion as candidates travel to testing centers.
The Higher Education Institutions Examination (YKS) is Turkey’s centralized university entrance test. It will be held in three sessions on Saturday and Sunday.
Çiftçi said 2,425,560 candidates would take the exam at 11,883 schools across the country, with 44,886 security personnel and 6,907 teams assigned to the event.
Football has drawn crowds to outdoor screenings since Turkey returned to the World Cup for the first time in 24 years.
Turkey’s opening match against Australia was shown on giant screens in İstanbul and other cities. Hundreds of fans also watched the game at the 2,000-year-old Antiphellos Theater in Kaş, a Mediterranean resort town in Antalya province.
Australia defeated Turkey 2-0, leaving the Turkish team under pressure before its match with Paraguay. Paraguay also lost its opener, suffering a 4-1 defeat to tournament co-host the United States.
The United States and Australia are the other teams in Group D. The top two teams in each group and the eight best third-place teams will advance to the 32-team knockout stage.
© Agence France-Presse