Christian Culture in Turkey under Attack: Government Keeps Silent

Case information
Incident date
Country
Türkiye
Place
Istanbul
Categories
  • Government Restrictions
Attack Against
  • Faith
Perpetrator / Motive Indicators
  • Islamist
Societal Sphere
  • Governmental
Religious Freedom / Discrimination
  • Freedom of Religion
Place of Incident
  • Government Building
Bias Indicators
  • Significance of Property/Structure/Location to religious community
  • Victim/Witness Perception
Reported to Police
  • No
Response of Local Authorities
  • Unknown
Symbolic image; not a photograph of the reported incident.Image credit: engin akyurt on Unsplash

Turkey's Minister for Culture and Tourism has been harshly confronted in parliament by Garo Paylan, an Armenian member of the opposition. The confrontation follows the latest instance of targeted desecration of Christian sites in the Country and Turkey's silence and apparent indifference regarding the repeated desecration of those sites and the erasure of Christian culture. The 18th-century Sup Toros Armenian Church in Kayseri had been heavily damaged in January 2021. Paylan criticised the governments' failure of an action to protect historical and cultural-religious sites officially recognized as such by UNESCO, such as the Hagia Sofia and other churches throughout the Country. He additionally criticised the conversion of Churches to mere venues for tourism, Museums, Hotels and Galleries. An official statement is expected.

Sources