EU lends support to mosque-cemevi project


Date posted: September 12, 2013

The European Union, which has been closely following the rights of Alevis in Turkey for years, has lent its support to a mosque-cemevi project to be built in Ankara. The European Commission said it supported dialogue that led to mutual understanding and peaceful coexistence, calling these principles the “hallmark of the EU.”

Peter Stano, the spokesperson for European Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy Stefan Füle, underlined that it was up to religious communities to decide how to build their places of worship. “The European Commission supports dialogue between all religious communities leading to mutual understanding and peaceful coexistence, this being the hallmark of the EU.”

“It is for religious communities to decide what, where and how to build,” he said.

Drawing attention to the exclusion of cemevis from Turkish state funds, Stano said the commission had made it clear on various occasions before that cemevis should be recognized as places of worship and benefit from provisions of relevant legislations.

The EU Commission has shown keen interest in the rights of Alevis and non-Muslim groups in its yearly Turkey progress reports published every autumn. In its last report published in October last year, though the commission had welcomed an official apology by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for the Dersim Massacre of 1937, it strongly criticized the lack of improvement regarding the rights of Alevis.

“Concrete follow-up of the opening made in 2009 to the Alevis is lacking. Cem houses were not officially recognised and Alevis experienced difficulties in establishing new places of worship. Alevis were concerned by the marking of many houses of Alevi citizens in a number of provinces and by incidents against them. Complaints were submitted to the prosecutors’ offices by Alevi associations; judicial and administrative investigations are continuing. A demand to open a cem house in the parliament was rejected on the grounds that Alevi MPs could go to the mosque. Several commemoration ceremonies by Alevis were prevented by police, some through the use of force as was a demonstration against the closure of the Madimak court case. Some Alevis encountered job discrimination in the civil service,” the report said.

The project to be built in the Mamak district of Ankara envisages a mosque and a cemevi built together in a bid to end the enmity between the two sects of Islam.

Source: Today's Zaman , September 11, 2013


Related News

Turkey’s Erdogan takes cue from Hitler, Stalin and Khomeini

There is something deeply disturbing about the direction in which Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party are taking Turkey. Writing in this newspaper last week, John Lyons compared the sweeping purges to McCarthyism in the US in the 1950s. That was altogether the wrong analogy.

UNESCO Global Monitoring Report and Turkish Schools

The Turkish schools around the world offers practical perspectives and practices in redefining “the human” and his needs, reintegrating him into society, overcoming the physical and methodological obstacles to education and leading a robust performance in the path to global peace. Although the report correlates the education crisis at first glance with poverty and social background, education remains as the number-one problem, in a varying extent, in the developed countries as well. What needs to be done is to convey how the Turkish schools are tackling or minimizing many educational problems and, finally, to find out what aspects of the schools’ methods can apply to public schools.

Russian expert: Kimse Yok Mu is in no way a terrorist organization

The investigations against Kimse Yok Mu (KYM) Foundation, among the 100 most active NGOs around the world, on the ground that it’s an armed terrorist organization continue to draw reaction.

Corruption investigation: Questions that will hound PM Erdoğan

Everyone is wondering now what is behind the corruption investigation, and the first “suspect” to come to many minds is the Islamist Gülen movement. Tensions between this group and the AKP have been rising over the years, and boiled over recently due to the prep-school issue – a matter that has received wide media coverage.

The Gülen movement denies this but the vitriol flying between daily Zaman, which is close to Gülen, and Yeni Şafak, which is staunchly pro-AKP, is enough to give one a sense of the bitter struggle involved.

KCK suspect Ersanlı says doesn’t believe Hizmet behind coup, terror trials

Professor Büşra Ersanlı, who is among suspects in an investigation into the Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK) on terrorism charges, has said she doesn’t believe claims raised by some officials linked with government that the faith-based Hizmet Movement led by Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen is behind major trials.

Teacher detained just after giving birth, handcuffed to bed at hospital

Turkish teacher Fatma Ozturk was detained just after she gave birth to her baby at Ege Umut Hospital in Manisa’s Turgutlu district while police handcuffed her to a bed she is resting on.

Latest News

Turkish inmate jailed over alleged Gülen links dies of heart attack in prison

Message of Condemnation and Condolences for Mass Shooting at Bondi Beach, Sydney

Media executive Hidayet Karaca marks 11th year in prison over alleged links to Gülen movement

ECtHR faults Turkey for convictions of 2,420 applicants over Gülen links in follow-up to 2023 judgment

New Book Exposes Erdoğan’s “Civil Death Project” Targeting the Hizmet Movement

European Human Rights Treaty Faces Legal And Political Tests

ECtHR rejects Turkey’s appeal, clearing path for retrials in Gülen-linked cases

Erdoğan’s Civil Death Project’ : The ‘politicide’ spanning more than a decade

Fethullah Gülen’s Vision and the Purpose of Hizmet

In Case You Missed It

Philippine education minister invites Turks to open more schools in his country

Former Norwegian PM: Our center takes same approach as Gülen

Pakistan Today Editorial: The Turkish connection and Turkish schools

Local NGOs urge Georgian gov’t to avoid returning Turkish teacher back home

Pained by the tragedy, Izmir doctor moves to Somalia

8-year-old cancer patient denied passport due to father’s alleged links to Turkey’s Gülen group

Junior Coalition Partner Demands Explanation Why Bulgarian Govt Turned over Abdullah Buyuk to Turkey

Copyright 2026 Hizmet News