How the consecutive AK Party governments have contributed to the improvement of minority rights in Turkey
When Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan participated in the groundbreaking ceremony of St Ephrem Syriac Orthodox Church in Istanbul on August 3, it was seen as a significant event in the history of the Turkish Republic.
“The new Syriac church under construction is a church to be built in accordance with Turkish regulations. That’s why the phrase ‘the first church of the Republican period’ is used,” Susin toldFor Susin, a 72-year-old Syriac-Turkish businessman, the renovation of religious spaces of minorities and stone-laying of St Ephrem Syriac Orthodox Church in Istanbul became a reality with the consistent support of the AK Party leader Erdogan.
The origin of Syriacs can be traced to the Middle East. Susin says they belong to the ancient Arameans heritage. In ancient times, Arameans had dominated Mesopotamia, the ‘Cradle of Civilisation’, between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers in the present-day Middle East for centuries. One of the oldest surviving Christian communities in the world, Syriacs speak Aramaic, an ancient language, and their scriptures have long been written in the letters of its ancient alphabet.
Since the beginning of the Ottoman Empire, the predecessor state of Turkey, non-Muslim communities, from different Christian denominations to Jews, had had their worshipping places across imperial territories. “With the president’s personal participation of the groundbreaking ceremony of a church, Turkey sends a symbolic message to the whole world and also its own people,” Alcan told“It’s very important message to me. The president has always emphasised that minority people are constituent elements [in Turkey]. It’s all clear that freedom of worship is an indispensable part of minority life,” Levi said.
“This [groundbreaking ceremony] signifies one of the most important developments in Turkish state policies, in my opinion. It’s quite a positive development,” Kopana said. Between 2003 and 2014, more than a thousand “unidentified” non-Muslim properties, which were either confiscated by the state in the past or unused by non-Muslims for different reasons, have been reinstated to minority community foundations,Turkey has also rewritten its regulations concerning foundations or waqfs in the old Ottoman language, enacting the new law of foundations in 2007 as part of EU adaptation policies, paving the way for improving minority rights.
Susin is not alone on his judgment on how the AK Party has tried to improve minority standards in Turkey.
France Dernières Nouvelles, France Actualités
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