TURKEY: 4th century Syriac monastery battles neighbouring villages for land rights

Record ID: 572775

  • Title: TURKEY: 4th century Syriac monastery battles neighbouring villages for land rights
  • Date: 23rd January 2009
  • Summary: MIDYAT, MARDIN PROVINCE, TURKEY (RECENT) (REUTERS) WIDE OF MOR GABRIEL MONASTERY VARIOUS OF MONASTERY TOWERS MONASTERY COURTYARD VARIOUS OF SYRIAC CHRISTIANS PRAYING (SOUNDBITE) (Turkish) KURYAKOS ERGUN, PRESIDENT, MOR GABRIEL MONASTERY FOUNDATION, SAYING: "This monastery is 1600 years old. The lands disputed by the court case have belonged to the monastery since the day it was built. After the villagers complained, officials from the local authorities arrived and said 267 acres of the monastery land is actually forest land. They prosecuted us for this reason, filing a case against us on the grounds of violation of government property." VARIOUS OF PRAYER CEREMONY (SOUNDBITE) (Turkish) KURYAKOS ERGUN, PRESIDENT, MOR GABRIEL MONASTERY FOUNDATION, SAYING: "The monastery has great religious significance for Christians and Syriacs. Syriacs see this monastery as a second Jerusalem. Everyone is trying to react to this as much as possible through democratic processes, through parliament, the government, and other channels." MORE OF CEREMONY DISPUTED LAND BETWEEN THE MONASTERY AND NEARBY VILLAGES (SOUNDBITE) (Turkish) MEHMET DILEK, CANDARLI VILLAGE MAYOR, SAYING: "Villagers and officials were called to set clear borders between the monastery and the villages. They did not accept the border that we proposed and we did not accept the border that they proposed. That is why we have this dispute." VARIOUS OF MONASTERY
  • Embargoed: 7th February 2009 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Turkey
  • Country: Turkey
  • Topics: History,Religion
  • Reuters ID: LVA96WJSGF0K1J8PM78YOPQH6UCJ
  • Story Text: In a remote village near the Turkish-Syrian border, a small group of monks chant in Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ, inside one of the world's oldest functioning monasteries.
    Tucked amid rugged hills where mosques and minarets rise in the distance, the fourth century Mor Gabriel monastery stands out as a relic of an era when hundreds of thousands of Syriac Christians lived and worshipped in Turkey.
    But a land dispute has erupted between Mor Gabriel and neighbouring villages, a row which some consider a new chapter in the long history of religious persecution of the small Christian community by the Turkish state.

    "This monastery is 1600 years old. The lands disputed by the court case have belonged to the monastery since the day it was built. After the villagers complained, officials from the local authorities arrived and said 267 acres of the monastery land is actually forest land. They prosecuted us for this reason, filing a case against us on the grounds of violation of government property," said Kuryakos Ergun, a representative for Mor Gabriel.

    "This is our land. We have been here for more than 1,000 years," he added, surveying the barren land and villages from the monastery's rooftop. "We have our maps and our records to prove it. This is not about land. It's about the monastery."
    The Mor Gabriel case is testing freedom of religion and human rights for non-Muslim minorities in this overwhelmingly Muslim country that aspires to join the European Union.
    The dispute, which has become a rallying cry for Christian church groups across Europe, began when Turkish officials redrew the boundaries around Mor Gabriel and the surrounding villages in 2008 to update a national land registry.
    The monks say the new boundaries turn over land the monastery has owned for centuries to the villages, and also declared some monastery land as public forest.
    A court in Midyat is expected to rule on the case on February 11.
    The ruling AK Party government, which has Islamist roots, has pursued liberal economic and political reforms, but the EU says more needs to be done to promote religious freedom.
    In the name of Turkey's strict secular laws, authorities have expropriated over decades millions of dollars worth of property belonging to Christians. Syriacs, Armenians and Greek Orthodox Christians -- remnants of the Muslim-led but multi-faith Ottoman Empire -- are viewed by many as foreigners.

    "Villagers and officials were called to set clear borders between the monastery and the villages. They did not accept the border that we proposed and we did not accept the border that they proposed. That is why we have this dispute," said Mehmet Dilek, mayor of the nearby Cadarli village.
    A local prosecutor initiated a separate court case against the monastery after mayors of three villages complained that the monks were engaged in "anti-Turkish activities" and of illegally converting children into the Christian faith.
    The monks say the mayors are instigating anti-Christian feelings by accusing Mor Gabriel of being against Islam.
    But rights groups say there is a campaign to close down the monastery.
    The Syriac Universal Alliance, a leading Syriac group based in Sweden said the proceedings would not be allowed to take place without government support.
    Syriac Christians are one of Turkey's most ancient communities. There were 250,000 Syriacs when Ataturk founded Turkey after World War I from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire.
    Today they number 20,000. Syriacs migrated throughout the 20th century to Europe, fleeing first from persecution by the new secular republic, and later, from violence between Kurdish separatist rebels and the Turkish military in the southeast.
    Many churches and monasteries in southeast Turkey -- known to Syriac Christians as Turabdin or "the mountain of worshippers" -- are now abandoned and in ruins.
    Considered the "second Jerusalem" by Syriacs, Mor Gabriel was built in 397 AD near the border of today's Syria and Iraq.
    The ochre-coloured limestone building has seen invasions by Romans, Byzantines, Crusaders and Islamic armies, and the monastery was once raided by the Mongol leader Tamerlane.
    After falling into disuse, Mor Gabriel was revived in the 1920s and today it teaches the Syriac faith and Aramaic language to a group of 35 boys, who live and study at the monastery.
    By law, Syriacs must attend state schools where teaching is in Turkish, but they can be taught about their own language and religion outside school hours.
    A small group of black-clad monks, nuns and a bishop live within the walls, preserving the ancient Syrica liturgy and tending to the orchards and gardens. They worship in a renovated chapel that contains Byzantine mosaics.
    Mor Gabriel receives more than than 100,000 visitors a year, many of them from the Syriac diaspora in Germany and Sweden.
    A trickle of Syriac families have returned in the last few years from the diaspora, encouraged by a drop in violence and Turkey's easing language and cultural restrictions on its minorities as part of EU-linked reforms.
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