October 08, 2004

ERP KiM Newsletter 08-10-04

Bomb attack on Patriarchate of Constantinople

Today, there are only 2,500 Greeks left in a city that has a population of over ten million. The Patriarchate has remained in the city and has continued to perform its international role among autocephalous Orthodox Churches despite all difficulties. The closure of the Patriarchal school of theology on the island of Halki has deprived the Patriarchate of priests. In 1955, five centuries after the fall of the city, a pogrom sponsored by the Turkish government led to the final assault against the city's Greek Orthodox population. During the 1960's, tens of thousands of Greeks were expelled from the city. Since then Greek population has dwindled even more. The city that was once the center of Christian civilization now symbolizes the status of Eastern Christians who have been steadily forgotten, if not abandoned, by their western counterparts. The most recent attacks on the Patriarchate threaten to expel last remaining Greek Orthodox Christians from the ancient Metropolis of the Christian World. On the other hand, Turkey expects to join EU although it has failed to grant Christians their religious and other human rights.

Hagia Sophia (Holy Sophia) - The Church of Divine Wisdom, Constantinople, 6th c.,
as it appeared before it was turned into a mosque in1453. Hagia Sophia remained a symbol of once flourishing Roman Christian Empire and the Orthodox Church worldwide. The glorious Cathedral was a scene of most brilliant Christian services and imperial coronations the world has ever seen. The church is now a museum and still treasures traces of the most beautiful Byzantine mosaics and architecture.

Bomb damages seat of Orthodox Church in Istanbul*

Interior of St. George's Church which was attacked by a bomb

ISTANBUL, Oct 7 (AFP) - A home-made bomb damaged the seat of the Orthodox Church in Istanbul overnight but no one was hurt in the explosion, Anatolia news agency reported Thursday.

The device was lobbed over the wall around the patriarch's residence and exploded in the garden, blowing out several windows and damaging the roof of a nearby cathedral.

The ecumenical patriarchate in Istanbul is the Christian Orthodox world's highest authority.

In early September about 1,000 people demonstrated outside the building heeding calls by a Turkish ultra-nationalist movement and burning a puppet representing the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomeus I for his alleged attempts to reopen an Orthodox seminary on a Turkish island which had been closed since 1971.
 

*Istanbul - The Turks call the ancient city of Constantinople Istanbul, which comes from the Greek expression "eis tin Poli" (to the City). Polis (City) was a most usual expression used by so called Byzantines. The term "Byzantines" began to be used in the West in the Middle Ages for the Empire which was had always been called Roman Empire (Basileia ton Romaion) and had uninterrupted historical continuity with the Empire of Caesars. The people of the Empire called themselves Romaioi (Romans). Even after the Ottoman occupation in 1453 the Orthodox population of the fallen Empire were called by invaders Rum Milet (Roman people). Although Greeks by its culture and language, Eastern Romans clearly differentiated themselves from the pagan Hellenes. The capital of the old Empire was called Constantinople (according to Constantine the Great who transferred the imperial capital from Old Rome to the shores of Bosphorus) or New Rome (Nea Romi) which was as common an expression at that time as New York is today. In order to deny historical continuity to the Roman Empire in the East, Medieval Frankish historians reintroduced the old pagan name of Byzantium which had once existed on the location of Constantine's Christian Metropolis. The Patriarch of Constantinople is respected as "First among equals" (primus inter pares) in the community of Orthodox Bishops worldwide. However his jurisdiction extends only to dioceses belonging to his Patriarchate. The most of its faithful today live in Diaspora (particularly U.S).

REUTERS ALERTNET

Grenade rocks Istanbul's Orthodox patriarchate
07 Oct 2004 15:03:45 GMT

Patriarch Bartholomew I

ISTANBUL, Oct 7 (Reuters) - A hand grenade shattered church and monastery windows at the Greek Orthodox patriarchate in the Turkish city of Istanbul early on Thursday but no one was hurt, officials said.

"Two windows in the church and five in the monastery were smashed in the explosion," a patriarchate official told Reuters.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack, which took place at around 1:30 a.m. (2230 GMT).

Nationalists in overwhelmingly Muslim Turkey have targeted the patriarchate in the past.

Last month, far-right protesters clashed with police outside the complex and burned an effigy of Patriarch Bartholomew, spiritual leader of the world's 140 million Orthodox Christians. They oppose allowing the Greek Orthodox Church to own land.

Istanbul, then known as Constantinople, was the centre of Orthodox Christianity until it fell to the Muslim Ottoman Turks in 1453. The patriarch remains nominal head of the church, though the number of Orthodox Christians in Turkey is now tiny.

Turkey does not recognise Bartholomew as the ecumenical leader of Orthodox Christians.

The European Union, which Turkey aspires to join, has criticised state curbs on the Greek Orthodox Church and other non-Muslim communities.

The European Commission recommended on Wednesday that the 25-nation bloc begin entry talks with Turkey but pointed to areas where human rights must be improved, including restrictions on the patriarchate's legal and property rights.


Background Information:
 
1. The Greeks of Turkey (This Web site offers additional information on the plight of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and its Orthodox faithful in Turkey.
 
3. Ecumenical Patriarchate  (history, churches, art)
http://www.patriarchate.org/ecumenical_patriarchate/
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America http://www.goarch.org/ (lots of information about the Patriarchate, Orthodox Spirituality etc)
 
2. Massacres of September 6-7, 1955 http://www.hellas.org/constantinople/index.htm

The night of 6th to 7th of September 1955, a Turkish mob in Istanbul, organized and directed by state authorities, conducted a vicious pogrom against the Greek Community of Istanbul. As a result:
 
-Sixteen Greeks died (the 90-years old Fr. Mantas was burned alive), and thirty two were severely wounded.
-At least two hundred Greek women were raped. Hundreds of Greeks were tortured.
-Seventy three churches and twenty three schools were vandalized, burned or destroyed.
-One thousand four houses were looted; 4,348 stores, 110 hotels, 27 pharmacies and 21 factories destroyed.
-The Patriarchal and other Greek cemeteries were desecrated. The dead bodies of Patriarchs were unburied and profaned.
-Relics of Saints were burned or thrown to the dogs.
 
3. Human rights in Turkey: http://www.hr-action.org/thr/
 
4. The Greek Holocaust of Thrace, Asia Minor and Pontus
 
 
THE GREEKS OF ISTANBUL
 
Paper presented on the OSCE – ODIHR Meeting on Human Dimensions in Warsaw on October 24th, 2000
 
(Session 10: National Minorities)
 
Ladies and Gentlemen,
 

Patriarch Athenagoras in front of the burned Church  of St. Constantine of Psammathos, 1955

Under the terms of the Treaty of Lausanne which brought the Greco-Turkish War to an end, 120,000 Greeks stayed on in Turkey after 1923; this figure was offset by the 86,000 Muslims who remained in Greek Thrace. The number of Muslims in Greek Thrace today exceeds 100,000, while the Greek Community in Turkey, oppressed by a systematic orgy of persecutions, has dwindled to just 2,000 people.
 
Turkish diplomacy has been lying to all the international organizations for decades, claiming that the Greek minority which stayed on in Turkey after 1923 has shrunk for economic reasons and that Greeks fled Turkey en masse of their own free will in search of a better life, just like economic refugees the world over.
 
On behalf of a large Society whose members have been subjected to the hardships and cruelty of the Turkish persecutions, I should like, within the limited time at my disposal, to list just some of the actions carried out by the Turkish State over the past 70 years; I shall explain how even today Turkish justice is literally snatching properties of immense value from the hands of their rightful owners, the Greeks in Turkey.
 
ˇ       In 1928, the large district of Tatavla in Constantinople, 90% of whose residents were Greek, was burned to the ground.
 
ˇ       In 1941, as soon as Turkey had signed the “friendship and cooperation” agreement with Nazi Germany, it selectively mobilized young men of Greek, Armenian and Jewish descent between the ages of  25 and 40. These “conscripts”, many of whom suffered a tragic death, were sent to forced labour camps in the depths of Turkey ’s eastern provinces.
 
ˇ       In 1942, secure in the neutral position it maintained throughout the Second World War, Turkey devised the emergency property tax (Varlik Vergisi - No. 4305/12.11.1942). This tax, paid almost exclusively by Greeks, Jews and Armenians, was imposed in an unprecedented and totally arbitrary manner on the fixed assets belonging to Turkey ’s non-Muslim inhabitants. Those who were unable to pay the enormous sum demanded for this sudden tax within the time-limit of 30 days were arrested and removed to forced labour camps, where many of them died.
 
ˇ       On the night of 6th September, 1955 the Turkish government organized a staggering pogrom against the Christians living in Constantinople . Within the space of six hours, groups of demonstrators organized and directed by agents of the Turkish State burned, destroyed and looted 4,340 Greek shops, 2,600 Christian homes, 73 churches, 26 Greek schools, 110 Greek restaurants, 21 factories, 27 pharmacies and the premises of all the Greek newspapers published in Turkey. At least 20 people died and 200 women or girls were raped during that terrible night, which I also lived through as a child.
 
ˇ       In 1963 and 1964, the Turkish government launched a wave of expulsions of the Christians of Greek nationality who were living in Turkey ; as a result, approximately 48,000 Christians were forced to leave Turkey within just a few months. The expulsions were carried out on such a massive scale that the lists of refugees who had to leave Turkey for reasons of “public safety” included the names of hundreds of elderly people, four who were mentally ill, two handicapped individuals, one who was deaf and dumb and six who were dead!
 
ˇ       Almost simultaneously with the expulsions, the Turkish government put into effect Secret Decree 6/3801, issued on 2nd November 1964, which prohibited transfer of the ownership of property and other titles belonging to all individuals of Greek nationality and blocked, without exception, all the accounts held by these people at Turkish credit institutions and banks. This Secret Decree was rigorously implemented in Turkey for more than two decades until it was finally abolished - officially, at least - in 1987.
 
ˇ       In 1971, in violation of any notion of international obligation, the Turkish government decided to close the famous Theological School at Halki which it still keeps closed today, despite the enormous international outcry.
 
ˇ       Now, after the forced abolition of Secret Decree 6/3901 - an unprecedented piece of legislation for a so-called democratic country - Turkish justice has found another resourceful way to plunder the fixed assets of Greeks: it does not permit the sale or purchase of property belonging to the Greeks in Turkey, arguing “reciprocity” in the handling of their respective minorities which Greece and Turkey had agreed under Article 45 of the Treaty of Lausanne. Turkey considers that the Greek Law 1892/1990 imposing certain restrictions on the sale or purchase of property in all border regions of Greece, for reasons of national security, “prevents” the Muslims of Turkish nationality from buying and selling property in Greece ! In other words, Turkey is invoking the very treaty that it itself has systematically violated, debased and contravened by reducing the number of Greeks in Turkey from 120,000 in 1923 to the present 2,000, with the aim of seizing their properties! The “reciprocity” invoked by Turkish courts today is an unbelievable provocation by any reasoning, since this “reciprocity” refers to Greece’s right to reduce the number of Muslims in Thrace to the same number as the Turkish Republic reduced the Greeks in Turkey and is not, of course, a weapon for the pillaging of Greek properties! At this very moment, trials are taking place relating to vast properties that belong to Greeks, while Turkey - sometimes on the pretext of this so-called “reciprocity” and at others on the basis of a decision (which would be considered unprecedented in any civilized country) that the Greeks in Turkey have no rights of inheritance - has been expropriating as many Greek properties as it can.
 
ˇ       In addition to confiscating privately-owned properties, however, the Turkish Republic is today operating a wide variety of ingenious schemes aimed at gaining possession of the title deeds of properties belonging to the Greek Community in Turkey, which are of immense value. One such stratagem concerns the “discovery” by the Turkish courts in the course of the last few years that gifts made to Community institutions in Turkey by Greek benefactors after 1936 are invalid and that these properties belong to the Turkish State !
 
Ladies and Gentlemen,
 
After this brief summary of some of the actions carried out by the Turkish State you will understand why there are strong reservations regarding both the will and the ability of the Turkish Republic to conform to the European idea of a Just State, and why we must make a concerted effort to put a stop, even at this late stage, to the flagrant disregard for any kind of human right and for all the obligations which the Turkish Republic undertook within the context of the Treaty of Lausanne.
 
 

Constantinople as it appeared in its heyday
Perched on the peninsula jutting into the blue waters of Bosphorus New Rome was the most magnificent Christian city until its fall under Ottomans in 1453. Now its dwindling Orthodox Christian community with the Patriarchate of Constantinople remains only a reminder of the glorious days when the Church of Constantinople shone amidst Churches from Baltic Sea to the deserts of Egypt

 

Religious Discrimination: The Ecumenical Patriarchate


The Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople is the oldest active institution in Eastern Europe and the Balkans today. Its history dates back to 330 A.D., when Emperor Constantine moved the capital of the Roman Empire to the new city of Constantinople. Since then, the Patriarchate of Constantinople has been the spiritual center of Orthodox Christians worldwide, its influence spanning from Russia to the United States, and from Finland to South Africa.
 
The Patriarchate has suffered terrible hardships under the Ottoman yoke first, and the Turkish Republic later. Numerous Patriarchs, hundreds of Bishops, thousands of priests, monks and nuns were executed, imprisoned or exiled. Many Patriarchs and Bishops were deposed. Persecution continues even today.
 
On August 11, 1995, the US Senate passed a resolution condemning ongoing Turkish provocation against the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the closing of the Chalke Patriarchal School of Theology as a violation of international treaties to which Turkey is a signatory. The lengthy resolution enumerates established charges against the Turkish authorities and said it is in the best interests of the United States to prevent further incidents regarding the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the spiritual leader, it noted, of millions of US citizens.
 
The Patriarchal Theological School of Chalke: The Turkish Government arbitrarily closed the Chalke Patriarchal School of Theology in 1971. The School was established in 1844 as the principal educational foundation for the Patriarchate's clergy. Many Patriarchs of the Orthodox Church throughout the world, as well as many Orthodox Bishops in the United States, have graduated from the School of Chalke.
 
Since 1971, Turkey refuses to re-open the School, in spite of the continuous requests by Patriarch Vartholomeos I and his predecessor, Patriarch Dimitrios. Speaking during the celebrations marking the 150th anniversary of the School's opening, Patriarch Vartholomeos mentioned that "it is inconceivable that this School should have operated in the days of monarchical Ottoman Empire, and be denied such a possibility in today's republican Turkey." He added that "in a secular state, such as Turkey, all religions and dogmas should enjoy equal possibilities of preparing and training their clerics," noting that Islam has a multitude of theological and clerical schools.
 
The closing of the Chalke School of Theology violates International Treaties to which Turkey has been a signatory, including the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne (article 40), the Helsinki Final Act of 1975, and the Charter of Paris.
 
The Patriarchal printing facilities: In 1975, four years after closing the School of Chalke, Turkey closed down the Patriarchal printing facilities, which were in operation since 1937.
 
The functioning of the Patriarchate: According to Turkish law, the Patriarch and the Bishops of the Holy Synod, must be Turkish citizens. However, given the elimination of the Greek Orthodox Community of Turkey and the closing of the Theological School of Chalke, it is becoming very hard for the Orthodox Church to appoint its primates.
 
Turkey opposes the ecumenicity of the Patriarchate, and prevents Bishops from the Dioceses of America, Australia and Europe (where most of the Patriarchate's flock resides) to participate and get elected in the Holy Synod; the obstacle being their US, Australian or European citizenship!
 
When the Ecumenical Patriarchate decided to open a representation office in Brussels (Oct. 1994), at the invitation of European Commission's President J. Delors, Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Ferhat Ataman said "the Patriarchate is not a legal body. There is no reason for it to create a representation at the European Union." Mr. Ataman added that the Ecumenical Patriarchate, apart from its religious duties, "has no legal personality," and concluded that there is no reason for it to establish a representation at the European Union." It is noted that one of the reasons that the Patriarchate was invited to establish an office in Brussels, was its influence over the religious and cultural affairs of the Orthodox Christians of Eastern Europe.
 
Thus, in its quest for ethnic and religious homogeneity, Turkey is threatening the existence of one of the oldest religious institutions worldwide, and to virtually establish the primacy of the Russian Patriarchate of Moscow over the Orthodox World.
 
Attacks against the Patriarchate: On September 1995, the President of the Turkish Parliament Mr H. Cindoruk, speaking at a meeting of the American-Turkish Council of Businessmen, threatened that "the Patriarchate would be turned to a museum, in case the Patriach makes a mistake." Mr. Cindoruk's remarks were published in the mass-circulation newspapers "Gumhuriyet" and "Yeni Yuzyil."
 
On March 1994, two firebombs were hurled by unidentified individuals into the Patriarchate's yard in Istanbul. The fire which broke out was quickly put out by officials before any damage was caused.
 
On April 1994, the newly-elected Islamist mayor of the Phanar district of Istanbul, where the Holy See is located, threatened that he would make a "triumphant entry into the Ecumenical Patriarchate through the sealed gate"—the gate where Patriarch Grigorios V was hanged on April 10 1821, Easter Sunday. The gate has remained closed ever since.
 
Turkish press attacks the Patriarch: Reacting to the Patriarch Vartholomeos' visit and speech in front of the European Parliament in 1994, Turkish nationalistic press has required that his All Holiness be tried for traveling abroad.
 
June 4, 1995: The turkish weekly magazine "Aksiyon" published an editorial cover story titled "The Patriarch has gone over the limit." The magazine called the Turkish government to remove Patriarch Vartholomeos from his seat, in order "to prevent future religious leaders from dreaming of universality (ecumenism)." The magazine added that "Patriarch Vartholomeos is no different from Iakovos [the present Greek-Orthodox Archbishop of North and South America].
 
October 1994: Turkey's mass-circulation newspaper "Sabah" accused the Patriarchate of moving towards "ecumenicity" and that its international personality "will be made official in mid-November." The report said such a development would harm Turkey's interests and accused the Turkish foreign ministry of inertia. It is noted that Islamist and nationalist intellectuals try to instigate anti-Greek and anti-Patriarchate hatred claiming that the "Phanar wants to acquire the status enjoyed by the Vatican," that is, independent statehood.
 
  

 Eugčne Delacroix - Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople.
Constantinople was first sacked by Crusaders in 1204. This was one of the most shameful events in the Christian history of the West for which Pope John Paul II made special apologize during his recent visit to Athens. The Crusaders incited by a rapacious Doge of Venice plundered the Christian capital, sacked its magnificent churches and palaces, and raped nuns. Most beautiful works of art and holy relics were stolen from Constantinople which never fully recovered its glory. The second sack by Sultan Mehmed in 1453 marked the end of the Christian Capital and the Empire.

 

THE NIGHT OF TERROR IN CONSTANTINOPLE - POGROM 1955

 
Under the terms of the agreement regarding the exchange of populations in the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, the Greek population of Constantinople-a thriving community-and the muslim community residing in Western Thrace were exempted from the exchange process.
 
In the beginning of the 20th century there were 300,000 Greeks residing in Constantinople.
 
They had managed to survive there despite centuries of oppression and persecution under the Ottoman yoke. But the Turks were determined to expel all Greeks from their ancient home using all available means. Thus, the Turks systematically used the following measures in order to accomplish their objective :
 
a) In May 1941, large numbers of young men ranging in age from 18-38. were conscripted into the Turkish army from the Greek and Armenian communities The Turkish intention was to exterminate these young men through the well-known method of <<forced-labour battalions>>. If this extermination plan was not successful it was due to protests from the Western allies and the defeat of the Germans in Stalingrad in December 1942. Seeing the tides of war shifting, the Turkish authorities permitted the discharge of these soldiers.
 
b) On 11 Noverriber 1942, the Turkish government passed a law regarding taxation of property of non-muslims, known as the VA RLIK VE RGISI. Through this !aw non-muslim citiizens had to submit, without the right to appeal, to the discretion and arbitrary judgment of the tax clerks. The tax clerks, in turn, were instructed to appraise property at amounts many times over the actual value of each property. Then, if the individual concerned was unable to make payments of the enormous tax share (quota), the property was seized and the unfortunate owners were exiled to ACKALE, in Anatolia.
 
As a result (of the use) of these harsh and inhuman measures, by 1955 only 25,000 people were left, rather than the 450,000 that should have been their number given a normal rate of growth in 35 years.
 
On the night of the 6th September 1955, and using the Cyprus situation as a pretext, the Turks dealt the coupdegrace to the remaining inhabitants. The whole story of this pogrom is as follows :
 
On Saturday the 3rd of September, 1955, the wife of the Turkish Consul in Thessaloniki asked for, and received, from a photographer in Thessaloniki supposedly for a keep-sake a series of photographs and films of the Turkish Consulate and the neighboring home where Kemal Ataturk was born. The very next day she and her family left for Turkey.
 
At ten past midnight on the 6th of September,1955, in the garden of the Consulate, between the two buildings, dynamite exploded resulting in broken windows in both buildings. The Greek authorities rushed immediately to the scene. They established that two more explosive devices had been positioned in the Consulate yard and that within the building there was only one Turkish guard. In the investigation that followed it was determined that the explosives were placed there by the guard and his accomplice, a Turkish student at the Law School of the University of Thessaloniki, Oktai Egin Faik, who had brought the dynamite from Turkey a few days earlier.
 
On the 6th of September, Turkish newspapers using forged versions of the photos of the Turkish consul's wife and even before the explosion took place in Greece, depicted Kemal's birthplace as totally destroyed. By the evening, newspapers all over Turkey knew of the alleged destruction of Kemal's home setting off waves of anger among the Turkish populace.
 
The Turkish authorities then transported large groups of people in trains and military vehicles from Anatolia to Constantinople.
 
The attack by the angry mobs began at 5 : 50 P.M on the 6th of September 1955 and ended at 02 : 00 A.M on the 7th of September 1955. The police calmly assisted and even guided the mobs, in their relentless path of destruction.
 
At 00 : 20 A.M on the 7th of September 1955 martial law was finally declared, at 02 : 00 A.M curfew began and at 02 : 30 A.M the authorities had restored a semblance of order.
 
Screaming slogans <<Today your property, tomorrow your lives>> the mobs had perpetrated terrible crimes. Those who guided them knew that by terrorizing the last Greek residents of Constantinople they would compel them to desert their homeland, once and for all. Simultaneously by destroying monuments which were proof of the glorious Greek past of Constantinople, they would eradicate even future reminders of the Greek presence.
 
The results of the vandalisms were : 

-the Theological School of Halki, the Marasleios School, The Monestary of Valoukli, the -Zappeio School for Girls and many other sites, suffered great damage. 
-of the 83 Greek Orthodox churches in the City 59 were burned and most others suffered serious damage to the icons and ancient paintings of great value. 
-the tombs of Patriarchs were destroyed, Christian cemeteries and ossuaries were defiled ;
-3,000 homes were looted and destroyed ; 
-4348 Greek stores were looted and destroyed ; 
-200 Greek women were raped ; 
-hundreds of Greeks were ill-treated or tortured, such as the old Bishop of Derkon Iakovos; the metropolitan of Ilioupolis Yennadios, whose beard was cut off and who was then dragged through the streets so that he would die shortly thereafter from ill-treatment; and Bishop Pamphilou Yennadios that was thrown into the burned ruins of Valoukli; 
-15 Greeks were murdered and among them a 90 year old monk at the Valoukli Monastery, Chrys. Mantas, who was burned alive. Many others in the monastery were seriously wounded.
 
After the pogrom a great portion of the Greek population left Constantinople to save their lives.
 
On the 20th of September,1975, in a special 35 page Survey section of the influential English magazine, The Economist, it was written : <<Turkish charges that the Moslem population in Western Thrace is harried by the Greek authorities are gross exaggerations. In 1923 there were 300,000 Greeks living in Constantinople and 110,000 Turks living in Thrace. Today, there are 15,000 Greeks living in Istanbul and 120,000 Turks in Thrace. The Greeks ask, with some justification, which country has been putting the pressure on which minority>>. (Survey-15).
 
It is important for us to realize that today,1982, only 4,000 Greeks still remain in Constantinople. (Today the number has fallen to 2500)

The Third Sack of Constantinople - Turkish Pogrom of 1955

 
Saint Sophia in the 10th century (Drawing of an artist of the 19th cent). Saint Sophia today, a turkish mosque. Ruins of the church of St Constantine and Helen after having been burnt.

A jubilant turkish mob after looting Greek property. Even cemetries have not been respected. Open graves and bones dispersed. A vision of the last Judgement.
 
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