Istanbul: Should one worry about security on the Princes’ Islands?

Lraper Church Bulletin 07/08/2005
Contact: Deacon Vagharshag Seropyan
Armenian Patriarchate
TR-34130 Kumkapi, Istanbul
T: +90 (212) 517-0970, 517-0971
F: +90 (212) 516-4833, 458-1365
[email protected]
SHOULD ONE WORRY ABOUT SECURITY ON THE PRINCES’ ISLANDS?
(assorted from various news despatches)
<; (English page) The population of the Metropolitan Istanbul area, together with its outlying suburbs, is said to have reached around 16 million people. During the hot and humid summer months, it is only natural that the masses prefer to spend their weekend holidays by the sea. The shores of the Bosporus, the nearby Black Sea and Marmara Sea resorts and especially the Princes' Islands, always had Sunday visitors. However, it seems that things have changed for the worse during the last two years since Coskun Ozden, the Mayor of the Princes' Islands, switched political parties. Newspapers have been reporting that fundamentalist summer camps have been founded on Buyuk and Heybeli Islands. An article in the Cumhuriyet Daily relates that liberal Turkish women wearing regular one piece swimming suits were spat upon by fundamentalist women with headscarves. This is alarming news for the Princes' Islands which are traditionally inhabited mostly by liberal and secularist Turkish islanders, and Armenian, Syriac, Jewish and Greek minority community members. The Mayor recently defended himself saying, "Our citizens belonging to minority communities have summer camps on Kinali Island, why shouldn't our Muslim citizens enjoy their own?" The Mayor was forgetting, of course, that the Greek or Armenian children's camps, since their days of foundation, have never caused any discomfort to the islanders. There are widespread rumours in the city that, in order to gain political support before the next nation-wide elections, certain municipalities with ultra-nationalist and religious fundamentalist constituencies are purposely distributing free seabus and ferry tokens, directing the provincial masses in the slum areas of the city to the Princes' Islands on weekends. Many of these people have not been schooled in an urban metropolitan society and most of them lack regular beach manners. For example, it is now possible to see sunbathers and swimmers on the Islands, men and women, going about freely in their regular white underwear rather than swimming suits. One would wonder what the Mayor of the Princes' Islands or the Prime Minister of Turkey would do if their family members were approached by people in their wet, obscene white underwear? The islanders have also been complaining about the rising number of weekend visitors who publicly utter derrogatory remarks against the non-Muslim minorities. Another problem is the lack of public facilities on the Princes' Islands. Masses who visit the Islands during the weekends litter and pollute the sea, the seaside, the green park areas and even the gardens of private houses since the public toilets on the Islands do not suffice. Weekend crowds have even begun to knock on the doors of private houses demanding to use the toilet and shower facilities of the islanders. One man said that, early in the morning, he went to buy a newspaper from the paper kiosk by the pier and was shocked to see that some thirty non-residents were sleeping on the pavements and had clearly been there through the night. These impressions now widely shared by the media and the islanders cause security concerns. There have been many street fights since the beginning of the summer season, and at least twice policemen have been also attacked. On Sunday 31 July, during another street fight, a policeman thought he had to fire in the air to calm down a group of non-residents and, attacked by someone nearby, he wounded a bystander. The Marmara Armenian daily asked in its front page article on 1 August whether residents should not worry about their security, since even the armed units have begun to feel insecure. Whether these concerns are exaggerated or not, time will show. However, the Governor's office, the Mayor of the Princes' Islands and concerned business circles clearly need to work out and implement a joint project to create new facilities and perhaps to designate new, free beach areas on the Princes' Islands for the non-residents who invade the Islands during weekends.