MINORITIES

Zuart Sudjian wages formidable legal battle for the return of land that belongs to her family, unlawfully seized by the State and site of Diyarbakır Airport today

Seized by the state with 1964 Decree, a landed property belonging to the former Ecumenical Patriarch Vapurci will be returned and registered in the name of his heirs by Supreme Court ruling. The legal victory paves the way for the return of other properties that were transferred to the Treasury with the Declaration.

The trailer of the web-documentary titled ‘Turkey, the Legacy of Silence’, directed by Anna Benjamin and Guillaume Clere, has been released.

The agenda of the meeting of the Interfoundational Solidarity Platform (VADİP) held on 17 November 2014 was the Minority Foundations Representative elections. The elections will be held on 28 December, and a total of 125 Greek, Armenian, Jewish and Syriac foundations will vote, the minority representative to replace Laki Vingas is expected to be Armenian.

The third guest of The History Foundation’s Thursday Talks series titled ‘Deportation-Massacre-Genocide 1915-2015’ was Assistant Professor Nazan Maksudyan, Head of the Department of Social Sciences at Istanbul Kemerburgaz University. Maksudyan held a speech titled ‘Three Generations, Three Massacres: Armenian Children and Orphans from 1895 to 1915’ and we had the chance to talk to her about the perception of children during the Ottoman period, and the conditions and political roles of Armenian orphans.

Teachers that have come to Turkey from Greece, although their salaries are being paid, cannot attend class because the Istanbul Directorate of National Education has not issued the necessary permission. Istanbul Deputy Director of National Education Murat Altınöz, on the other hand, states that the procedure for the solution of the problem has been completed.

Lawyers of Emre Karaali, the Church of İzmit Pastor, called for the trying of Gendarme Lieutenant Levent Birsin stationed in Diyarbakır and Police Captain Hasan Erdoğan stationed at Silvan Police Directorate. The court ruled for the filing of criminal complaints against the two officials.

Zakarya Mildanoğlu’s book ‘Armenian Periodicals 1794-2000’ has been published by Aras Yayıncılık. Mildanoğlu’s work brings together around 3650 Armenian periodicals from the year 1794, when the first Armenian newspaper Aztarar was published, until the year 2000. We talked with Zakarya Mildanoğlu about his book which is the product of around 30 years of work, and the over 200 year history of Armenian periodicals.

A historical document included in an article by Ümit Kurt titled “I. Cihan Harbi Sonrası Ermeni Mallarının İadesi: Cebel-i Bereket Örneği/The Return of Armenian Properties After World War I: The Cebel-i Bereket Case” published in the November issue of the journal Toplumsal Tarih is striking in terms of its content.