11.03.2008 - Source: US Department of State

National/Ethnic Minorities ("Country Report on Human Rights Practices 2007") [ID 22977]

"The law provides a single nationality designation for all citizens and does not recognize ethnic groups as national, racial, or ethnic minorities. Citizens of Kurdish origin constituted a large ethnic and linguistic group. Millions of the country's citizens identified themselves as Kurds and spoke Kurdish. Kurds who publicly or politically asserted their Kurdish identity or publicly espoused using Kurdish in the public domain risked censure, harassment, or prosecution.

The NGO Minority Rights Group International reported on December 11 that millions who belonged to ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities remained unrecognized by the Turkish state, faced discrimination, and were increasingly under threat as a result of a growing wave of violent nationalism. The report noted that the law protects only three officially recognized minorities-–Armenian Orthodox Christians, Jews, and Greek Orthodox Christians-–and not the vast number of other ethnic and religious minorities, including Alevis, Ezidis, Assyrians, Kurds, Caferis, Caucasians, Laz, and Roma. The report stated that these "excluded minorities" were prohibited from fully exercising their linguistic, religious, and cultural rights.

The government maintained significant restrictions on the use of Kurdish and other ethnic minority languages in radio and television broadcasts and in publications.

 The Roma continued to face persistent discrimination and problems with access to education, healthcare, and housing. The government took no apparent steps during the year to assist the Roma community. A number of NGOs undertook activities to address problems faced by the Roma community. The European Roma Rights Center, Helsinki Citizens Assembly, and Edirne Roma Culture Research and Solidarity Association conducted a program to train the Roma community on civil society organization and activism. In December the Roma Culture and Solidarity Association of Izmir began literacy courses for Roma women in the region.

The law states that "nomadic Gypsies" are among the four categories of persons not admissible as immigrants."

Document(s): Open document

06.11.2007 - Source: European Commission

Minority Rights ("Turkey 2007 Progress Report [SEC(2007) 1436]") [ID 22421]

"However, Turkey's approach to minority rights remains unchanged. According to the Turkish authorities, under the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne minorities in Turkey consist exclusively of non-Muslim religious communities. In practice the minorities associated by the authorities with such Treaty are Jews, Armenians and Greeks. Without prejudice to the Treaty, the Turkish authorities consider Turkish citizens as individuals having equal rights before the law rather than as individuals belonging to the majority or to a minority
[...]
Turkey is a party to the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). However, its reservation regarding the rights of minorities and its reservation to the UN Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), regarding the right to education, are matters of concern9. Turkey has not signed the Council of Europe Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities or the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

The management of the minority schools, including the dual presidency, remains an issue. Further efforts are needed to remove discriminatory language from textbooks.
[...]
Overall, Turkey has made no progress on ensuring cultural diversity and promoting respect for and protection of minorities in accordance with European standards."

Document(s): Open document

06.11.2007 - Source: European Commission

Prohibition of non turkish mother-tongue teaching ("Turkey 2007 Progress Report [SEC(2007) 1436]") [ID 22424]

"Children whose mother tongue is not Turkish cannot learn their mother tongue in the Turkish public schooling system. Such education can be provided only by private educational institutions. In the case of Kurdish, all such courses were closed down in 2004. Today there are no opportunities to learn Kurdish in the public or private schooling system.

No measures have been taken to facilitate access to public services for non-speakers of Turkish, although interpretation is usually available in courts. In a case against the municipality of Sur in June 2007 the Council of State dismissed the mayor from office and dissolved the Municipal Council for providing multilingual municipal services. The court ruled that this is contrary to the constitutional principles that the language of the state is Turkish and that no language other than Turkish should be taught as a mother tongue (Articles 3 and 42 of the Constitution respectively). An appeal is ongoing.

Use of languages other than Turkish remains illegal in political life.[...]"

Document(s): Open document

08.2005 - Source: Amnesty International

AI: Anhaltende Muster schwerwiegender Menschenrechtsverletzungen; Reaktion der Behörden auf Berichte von Folter und Misshandlungen ist noch immer unzureichend; Einschränkungen der Meinungsfreiheit durch Verfassung und neues Strafgesetzbuch ("Memorandum on AI's recommendations to the government to address human rights violations") [#38256],  [ID 13792]

"MINORITY RIGHTS AND DISCRIMINATION

Amnesty International continues to be concerned about restrictions on the use of minority languages and calls for such obstacles to be lifted immediately. In particular, Article 42 of the Constitution, in which "No other language than Turkish may be taught in educational and teaching facilities to Turkish citizens as their mother tongue", appears to be contrary to international standards related to minority rights. Such standards include the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National, Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities which states that all UN member states should take "appropriate measures so that, wherever possible, persons belonging to minorities may have adequate opportunities to learn their mother tongue or to have instruction in their mother tongue". While Amnesty International welcomed the amendment of the Law on the Education and Teaching of Foreign Languages in 9 August 2002 to allow for the "learning of different languages and dialects used traditionally by Turkish citizens in their daily lives", the organization notes serious restrictions to this right, for example, the languages may only be taught to adults at private language courses. In addition, Article 42 of the Constitution was used to close the trade union, E
itim Sen, because it stated in its statute that it would work for the right to mother-tongueeducation. This case was a clear violation of the right to freedom of expression and association. There is the risk that other entities’ rights to freedom of expression may be similarly unnecessarily and arbitrarily restricted while Article 42 exists in the Constitution in its present state.

Similarly, Amnesty International is greatly concerned at cases launched against politicians for speaking in minority languages to audiences and distributing materials in these languages under Article 58 of Law 298 on Elections as well as Law No 2820 on Political Parties. Article 81 of the latter law appears to be particularly problematic stating:
a) …Political parties may not put forward the view that there are minorities in the country of the Republic of Turkey based upon difference of national or religious culture or creed or race or language …
c) Political parties may not use languages other than Turkish in the statute or program or publication, or in congresses or in meetings closed or open to the public or in mass meetings. They cannot distribute placards, signs, cassette or video tapes, brochures or announcements written in languages other than Turkish…

Article 122 of the draft of the new TPC which forbids discrimination on the basis of “language, race, colour, gender, political thought, philosophical belief, religion, denomination and other reasons” was amended at the last moment so that “sexual orientation” was removed from the draft. Amnesty International is therefore concerned that discrimination on the basis of sexuality was not criminalized in the new TPC. This is coherent with Article 10 of the Constitution which states that “Everybody is equal before the law without making any distinction on the basis of language, race, colour, gender, political thought, philosophical belief, religion, denomination and other reasons.” Amnesty International considers that both these articles should be amended to ensure full equality in law and practice of individuals of different sexual orientation.

Amnesty International is still seriously concerned about the ban on the wearing of headscarves in higher education in Turkey – it believes that this ban is discriminatory and disproportionate. Despite the amnesty proposed for students excluded from university, the ban has and will continue to result in many people being excluded from university education and in the suspension or dismissal of hundreds of women from university teaching posts as a result of their religious beliefs. Amnesty International urges the Turkish authorities to take steps to address this issue.

Amnesty International therefore considers that further steps need to be taken to improve minority rights in Turkey and to prevent discrimination. We urge that the country should sign and ratify international instruments in this area, including the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. Further it should ratify Protocol No.12 to the ECHR, which provides for a general prohibition of discrimination; and make the declaration under Article 14 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, empowering the Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to receive individual communications. The government should also withdrawits reservations in respect of Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Article 13 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights."

Document(s): Open document

19.05.2005 - Source: International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights

Need for eliminating discrimination of ethnic minorities ("Human Rights in the OSCE Region: Europe, Central Asia and North America, Report 2005 (Events of 2004)") [#32120],  [ID 13794]

"The Turkish government considers only Greeks, Armenians and Jews as minorities, and "creating a minority" by discussing minority problems is criminalized in various laws. The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) of the Council of Europe and international minority rights groups stated that there was a need for much progress in eliminating discrimination in Turkey.

Turkish legislation falls short of its obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in failing to institute mechanisms to eliminate discrimination against minorities, including non-citizens. Regular confidential intelligence circulars by the Turkish Armed Forces to military and civilian security authorities maintained their instructions on the surveillance of minorities, particularly Kurds, other minority members and minority rights activists.
...
An important step towards eliminating discrimination against the three of the non-Muslim minorities Turkey recognises under 1923 Lausanne Treaty was a regulation in January 2003 granting the right of the Armenian, Greek and Jewish foundations to register their properties in reversing a series of property confiscations since 1936. However, the regulation covered only a specified list of foundations and their properties, which were not taken from them by a court decision and registered for public institutions or private persons between 1974-2002. For instance, only one third of the Universal Greek Patriarchate foundation's properties were registered and the foundations were requested to evacuate the rest."

Document(s): Open document

07.2004 - Source: Minority Rights Group International

Protection of minority rights still falls short of EU standards ("Minorities in Turkey; Submission to the European Union and the Government of Turkey") [#25193],  [ID 13798]

"The application process and the conditional nature of EU membership have had a significant impact on human rights practice in Turkey. Turkey has devised and adopted a National Programme for the Adoption of the Acquis, and has made considerable progress through reform packages, including constitutional amendments and legislative reform. These have abolished the state security courts and amended regulations in order to permit, at least in theory, broadcasting in traditionally used languages and non-Muslim foundations to register properties. Further, Article 90 of the Constitution now states that international law shall take priority over national law when there is inconsistency between them.
The protection of minority rights still falls short, however, of European standards. Much remains to be done, from the very basic acceptance and recognition of minorities, through the basic right of certain minorities to live in and return to their homes, to the implementation of both the letter and the spirit of the new laws that purport to allow the practice of language and religion. This report, while not comprehensive, will examine the key issues, including the recognition of minorities, and the current ability of all ethnic, religious and linguistic groups to live freely. [...]"

Document(s): Open document