RELIGIOUS MINORITIES APPREHENSIVE OF LATEST

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ISTANBUL 000202

SIPDIS


E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/06/2013
TAGS: PGOV PHUM TU
SUBJECT: RELIGIOUS MINORITIES APPREHENSIVE OF LATEST
FOUNDATION REGULATIONS

REF: A. 02 ANKARA 8881

B. 02 ANKARA 7290

C. 02 ANKARA 6116

D. 02 STATE 44732


Classified By: CONSUL GENERAL DAVID ARNETT FOR REASONS 1.5 (B) AND (D).





1. (C) Summary: The General Directorate for Foundations
recently enacted regulations that were expected to allow
community (i.e. non-Muslim religious) foundations to reclaim
seized properties. The new regulations are part of the
EU-harmonization reforms aimed at enhancing religious
minority rights and, it was hoped, allowing foundations to
reclaim seized properties. Reaction from non-Muslim
community leaders ranged from outrage to indifference to
near-contentment, depending upon a community's reading of the
regulations and the amount of each community's disputed
property. However, one fact is unquestioned: property
acquisition and registration remains squarely in the
unsupervised hands of the General Directorate for
Foundations, the very body accused of appropriating many of
the properties to begin with. End Summary.


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THE NEW REGULATIONS
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2. (U) The new regulations, published in the Official
Gazette January 24, address three different issues: how
community foundations can acquire property, how they may use
such property, and how they may register "property already at
their disposal" (i.e. occupied but unregistered property).
Each portion of the regulation has its own ambiguities and
legal complexities.



3. (U) In the case of acquisition, it is unclear whether
newer religious community foundations, not currently on the
list, will be allowed to acquire further property as their
community grows. In the case of older communities with
shrinking populations, it is not clear if they will have the
option of acquiring new properties at all, as they will have
to explain, even if the property is willed or donated, what
"religious, charitable, social, educational, cultural, and
health needs" the new property will meet. The Ecumenical
Patriarchate and other communities with rapidly dwindling
populations fear that the General Directorate for
Foundations, the arbiter of whether the property may be
acquired, will deny them the inheritance, saying their needs
are already met by current properties.



4. (U) In the case of disposition of property already owned
and properly registered, the foundations are allowed to
"exercise their power of disposition of the property" in
order to meet the needs listed above. However, "the exercise
of real rights shall be subject to the permission of the
General Directorate for Foundations." Thus, rental or sale
of an existing property is not an unsupervised right.



5. (U) In the case of registration of currently owned
property, the regulation seems to preclude the possibility of
restitution for properties seized by the GoT between 1935 and
the present. Though the regulation is generous as to what
documents can be used to buttress an application for
registration (including utility bills, Ottoman deeds and
registries, and unapproved deed inspection records),the
caveat that the property must be "under the disposal of the
foundation" suggests that only property with documentation
problems, rather than property expropriated by the State,
will be covered under the law. Thus, one major point it was
hoped the new law would ameliorate is not addressed by the
regulation.


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GENERAL REACTIONS
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6. (U) Poloff spoke with representatives of all major
communities affected by the new regulations (the Ecumenical
Patriarchate, Armenian Orthodox Patriarchate, Suriyani
Orthodox Metropolitan, Jewish Community, and Chaldean
Catholics). Since the law is written specifically for
community foundations, the list of relevant groups was
appended to the regulation, though there is no mention of
what inclusion on the list of 160 foundations means. Whether
or not these are the only parties who can make use of the law
is unclear. The portion of the law related to registration
of currently owned property covers the years 1935 to present
(and the list of foundations is roughly accurate for those
registered in 1936). However, it is unclear if newer
foundations, such as the Istanbul Protestant Church
Foundation, can make use of the new "acquisition" regulations
or not, as they were not listed in the appendix.

7. (U) Of the total 160 foundations listed, the Ecumenical
Patriarchate has 74. The Armenian Orthodox Patriarchate has
34 foundations. The Jewish Community has 18, Suriyanis 6,
and Chaldean Catholics 3.



8. (C) Reactions to the regulation diverge widely.
Metropolitan Meliton of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, who has
principal responsibility for property issues, argues the
regulations are "one step forward, three steps back," in that
they fail to recognize or give status to the Patriarchate,
split Halki into two foundations, and make no provision for
the re-acquisition of expropriated property. Armenian
Orthodox, Suriyani and Chaldean Catholic churches are also
pessimistic about the regulations' limitations to varying
degrees, but suggest that the law may open some possibilities
for normalization of unresolved property problems and new
property acquisition. Finally, the Jewish Community is most
optimistic, seeing no new problems created by the law, and
some utility in the registration process. Except for the
Armenians and Greeks, all the communities with which post met
agreed that the appended foundation list was complete.


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SPECIFIC CONCERNS
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9. (C) "A Patriarch is not a Foundation": Greek and Armenian
Orthodox churches hold that their patriarchs, and the
immediate facilities in which they reside and work, are not
foundations, but simply patriarchates. As such, they should
be allowed to own and acquire property, as well as register
the property they now inhabit, in their own right (in both
cases, the patriarchates do not have any legal status or
deed, despite centuries of residence). Unlike the
Hahamhanesi (Chief Rabbinate),they have no established
foundation for the patriarchate itself, and argue that a
foundation is unacceptable because the patriarch alone
decides how the property should be administered, not a
committee (as is required in the law governing foundations).
This political and semantic fight prevents both parties from
coming to a modus vivendi with the GoT under the new
regulations, and continues a decades-old stand-off over what,
exactly, a patriarch is under Turkish law.



10. (C) "Applying to the Thief": Greek and Armenian Orthodox
and Chaldean Catholic churches all see restitution of
expropriated property as impossible under this law. Legal
problems "created" (in their terms) by the GoT in the
thirties prevented non-Muslim communities from either
registering properties or forming their own foundations.
Accordingly, over the course of the next 60 years, their
properties were taken over by the General Directorate of
Foundations. No mention is made in the regulation of how to
apply for restitution of properties which were seized, only
how to register properties which are still in the
communities' possession, but lack proper documentation.
Though all concede that the law technically could be
interpreted to allow for some form of restitution, such an
application must be approved by the General Directorate for
Foundations, the very body which took the properties to begin
with. In the words of Fr. Francois Yakan of the Chaldean
Catholic Church, "that would be like applying to the thief to
get your wallet back."


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COMMENT
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11. (C) The regulations fall well short of providing a
transparent and efficient means to reconcile property
seizures that the GoT itself recognizes were unlawful.
Normalization of the status of property already in the hands
of the foundations demands a willingness on the part of the
foundation to accommodate to the General Directorate's
willful interpretations of the law. The Jewish Community
long ago elected to accommodate itself. The Greek and
Armenian Orthodox churches continue to hold their political
ground in the interests of establishing a transparent and
reliable approach on the part of the General Directorate.
End comment.
ARNETT