DEBATE ON ‘MINORITIES’ LAW WORRIES TURKEY’S JEWS
By Yigal Schleifer, Jewish Telegraphic Agency
The Jewish Journal of greater L.A, CA
Dec 8 2006
Jewish and Christian leaders were optimistic when the Turkish
Parliament began debating a bill regulating minority foundations
and organizations.
The draft version — part of a reform effort driven by Turkey’s bid
for European Union membership — contained provisions making it easier
for minority groups to operate and reacquire properties that had been
confiscated by the state.
But after a heated debate on the measure, with many parliamentarians
objecting to its liberal approach, the version that passed Parliament
offered little improvement over the past. In any case, the bill was
then vetoed by President Ahmet Necdet Sezer, who felt it gave minority
foundations too much freedom.
The debate illustrates Turkey’s continuing struggle with the issue
of its non-Muslim minorities. But since Turkey must harmonize its
laws with the European Union’s if it hopes to gain admission to
the 25-member union, the question of minority foundations and how
to regulate them is certain to come up again, and could prove yet
another sticking point in the currently troubled relations between
Ankara and Brussels.
Turkey’s Jewish community, for example, has had 22 of its foundations
— synagogues and other property in Istanbul and in parts of Turkey
where Jews no longer live — taken away.
Like the old law, which was filled with bureaucratic hurdles and
burdens, the proposed one would have forbidden minority communities
from joining international organizations.
Now that Sezer, a staunch secularist who often is critical of
E.U.-inspired legislation, has vetoed the new bill, it goes back
to Parliament or must be shelved. Still, most disturbing for some
was the tone of the debate in Parliament, much of it centering on
whether allowing minority groups greater rights would give foreign
powers more influence in Turkey.
The legal thinking behind the proposal was the same as that behind
the older, more restrictive version, said Ester Zonana, a lawyer who
advises Turkey’s Jewish community — "approaching minority foundations
with a lack of trust."
For example, the law offered no way for minority groups to reclaim or
seek restitution for the thousands of properties — schools, synagogues
and churches, cemeteries and other real estate — confiscated by the
state in recent decades.
When the question of property restitution came up, some
parliamentarians asked whether allowing Turks of Greek origin to
reclaim property could force Turkey to hand back Istanbul’s historic
Hagia Sophia, the Byzantine church turned into a mosque by the Ottomans
and then a state museum in 1935.
A member of the government even came to Parliament to report that
Turkey holds documentation that proves the monument rightfully belongs
to it.
"I was very angry during the debate," said Mihail Vasiliadis, editor
of Apoyevmatini, a daily Greek newspaper based in Istanbul. "They were
not treating us as citizens. Why should I be treated differently than
a Muslim?"
The government, which is led by the liberal Islamic Justice and
Development Party, argued that reform is needed when it comes to how
minority foundations are handled.
"We are a nation that believes everyone has rights," Deputy Prime
Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin told Parliament.
Pope Benedict XVI’s four-day visit to Turkey last week shone a
spotlight on the question of religious freedom in the country. Some
3,000 Orthodox Christians remain in Turkey, with another 70,000
Armenians and 25,000 Jews.
The pope offered his support for Christians in Turkey, whom he
called "a small minority which faces many challenges and difficulties
daily." The pope’s visit also included a meeting with Turkey’s chief
rabbi, Ishak Haleva, at the Vatican’s consulate in Istanbul.
Though they are guaranteed the same rights as Muslim citizens,
Christians and Jews in Turkey long have complained about the legal
hurdles they face.
The Orthodox patriarchate — which has been in Istanbul for 1,700
years, since the city was known as Constantinople, capital of the
Byzantine Empire — is the frequent target of nationalist protests.
Grenades have been lobbed over its walls.
In recent decades the patriarchate has seen numerous properties,
including schools and cemeteries, confiscated by the state. Its
theological seminary was closed down in 1971 and has yet to be
reopened, leaving the patriarchate unable to train clergy.
Ankara also refuses to recognize the patriarchate’s status as
ecumenical, or global, saying it is responsible only for tending its
dwindling flock in Turkey.
"Minority rights of non-Muslims is the issue that we have had the
least progress on over the last six or seven years," said Ioannis
Grigoriadis, an assistant professor of political science at Isik
University here. "It’s a common theme in all the" reports on Turkey’s
E.U. membership bids.
"Other difficult issues have been dealt with more successfully, while
with the issue of non-Muslim minorities that has not been the case,"
he said.
Turkish historians trace suspicion of minority communities back to the
tumultuous period after World War I, when Greece invaded the nascent
Turkish state and other Western powers tried to carve up what remained
of the decaying Ottoman Empire. At the time, the minorities were seen
as being allied with the West.
In the early days of the Turkish republic, efforts were made to
bring all religious foundations, Muslim and non-Muslim, under the
government’s control, according to Elcin Macar, a professor at
Istanbul’s Yildiz Technical University who specializes in minority
issues.
But in the 1960s and ’70s, particularly as the Cyprus conflict became
more tense, the Turkish government moved toward greater restrictions
on non-Muslim communities, with Turkish courts issuing decisions that
allowed for the large-scale confiscation of minority properties.
"I believe that these decisions were not made in harmony with the law,"
Macar said. "They were discriminatory."
Although he believes there has been some improvement in minority
communities’ legal standing, Macar said the underlying suspicion of
them continues.
"The minority is still seen as a dangerous thing for us," he said.