The record of systemic discrimination experienced by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople in Turkey is included in the new report of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF). The report examines threats to religious properties in Turkey, including places of worship, religious institutions and cemeteries.
The report notes that although the Treaty of Lausanne provided protection and freedom of worship for the remaining non-Muslim communities in Turkey, this protection and freedom was often significantly curtailed, not infrequently, through action against Christian holy sites.
The report shows that the highest number of attacks on Greek Orthodox and other Orthodox churches occurred in the Marmara region of Istanbul, which is associated with the largest concentration of non-Muslim populations.
In addition, the report states that the seizure of property can be used as a form of retaliation, citing as an example the seizure of the Prince’s Greek Orthodox orphanage.
The particular orphanage was confiscated in 1964 by the Turkish authorities, who did not perform the necessary maintenance, thus leaving the building to suffer the wear and tear of time.
As noted, by the time the Ecumenical Patriarchate managed to regain ownership of the building through an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, “however, after 60 years of abandonment, the building had sustained significant damaged and fallen into disrepair.”
“The burden is on the Greek Orthodoxcommunity to repair and preserve the site at considerable financial cost,” the report added.
Although bombings and terrorist attacks have declined over the past decade, the report concludes that incidents of vandalism and destruction of religious property through arson and gold hunting, combined with the lack of prosecution of these incidents, have increasingly affected the Greek Orthodox and other Orthodox communities in Turkey.
In summary, the report finds that these findings are indicative of a wider political indifference to the protection and property rights of the country’s non-Muslim minority communities.
“Over the last century, Turkey’s non-Muslim populations have continued to decrease. This decrease came largely in response to a series of alarming incidents, such as the 1934 pogrom against the Jewish community in Thrace, the crippling wealth tax of 1942 levied against non-Muslims in Turkey, the 1955 pogrom against the Greek Orthodox community in Istanbul, the 1964 expulsion of Greek Orthodox residents of Istanbul, and the tense political environment leading up to the Turkish military intervention in Cyprus in 1974.
“These trends led to drastic population declines, especially within the Greek Orthodox community, which has dwindled to less than 2,000 persons from a population of over 100,000 in 1923.
“These historical trajectories have similarly had a significant impact on the preservation of religious sites, especially for those whose communities and congregations have disappeared. The ongoing trend of population decline in non-Muslim communities further makes the maintenance, protection, and sustainability of their respective religious sites especially challenging,” the report added.
https://greekcitytimes.com/2023/11/20/us-report-turkey-discrimination/