The Turkish prime minister's
announcement that the government will return hundreds of properties
confiscated from non-Muslim religious groups or compensate the groups
for properties sold to third parties is "a historic decision," said the
Vatican nuncio to Turkey.
"Even though the Roman Catholics will not benefit from this, it is an
important step that is a credit to Turkey," said Archbishop Antonio
Lucibello, the nuncio.
"It is a sign that is not just good, it's an excellent sign that the
government wants to reconstruct the unity of the country so there no
longer are first-class and second-class citizens," the nuncio said in a telephone interview from Ankara.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Aug. 28 that his
government would return hundreds of pieces of property -- including
schools, orphanages and hospitals -- that were confiscated by the
government in 1936.
The properties involved belonged to officially
recognized religious minorities: Jews, Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox
and Armenian Catholics, Syrian Orthodox, Syrian Catholics and Chaldean
Catholics.
Although Pope Benedict XVI, human rights supporters and the European
Union have pressed Turkey to recognize all religions, the Latin-rite
Catholic community and Protestant churches do not have official legal
standing in Turkey.
Archbishop Lucibello said the decision does not include the Church of
St. Paul at Tarsus, now a government-run museum, which church officials
have asked to have back.
"The government has made a commitment to continue looking for a
solution, and this decision gives us good reasons to hope," the
archbishop said. The case of the Church of St. Paul, he said, is
complicated by the fact that it was built by the Armenians, then taken
over by the Greek Orthodox and restored by Latin-rite Catholics.
Otmar Oehring, an expert on religious freedom in Turkey and director of
the human rights office of Missio, the German Catholic aid agency,
described Erdogan's decision as "a positive and courageous step."
"There wasn't any need for Erdogan to do this because talks with the
European Union" -- which Turkey has been trying to join -- "are at a
standstill. This decision won't restart the talks because the EU has
other pressing problems," Oehring told CNS in a telephone interview.
Oehring said several years ago that Erdogan forced the government to
return much of the confiscated property it still owned. The latest
decision would have the government compensate religious communities for
properties the government has sold to third parties.
"It will be costly for the Turkish state: I've read 700 million euros or about $1 billion," he said.
The Turkish Constitution proclaims Turkey as a secular country, but its
unique brand of secularism involves almost absolute control over
religion, including Islam. The government builds and funds mosques and
employs Muslim prayer leaders. It has granted full legal status only to
the foundations formed by a few minority religious groups, including the
Jewish community and the Greek Orthodox.
Minorities like the Latin-rite Catholic and Protestant communities,
"which do not have foundations, aren't affected by the new decision.
This means that the Catholic Church is in the same negative position it
was in."
Latin-rite Catholic parishes, dioceses and religious orders "own
property, but it's not clear if that ownership will be recognized.
Tomorrow the government could say, 'You don't exist legally, so you
don't own it,'" he said.
Other Catholic properties are owned by a foreign government, he said.
Catholic parishes operate on property owned by the Italian and French
embassies in Ankara and the French consulate in Istanbul. The Latin-rite
cathedral in Izmir is a protectorate of France, he said.
"For many years, non-Muslims were too afraid to ask for their properties
back, but there also is the fact that there no longer are Christian
communities in many of those places," Oehring said.
"The Jesuits, Franciscans and Dominicans had many buildings all over
Turkey and they just don't care because they don't have the numbers" of
faithful to use them or personnel to staff them, he said. "But they
still should seek compensation."