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I find this passage in your article most intriguing:
“According to Kiziltan, cultural and religious differences are not a problem for the Turkish people, unlike many of the countries in the EU. Turkey has long been a country of meshing cultures and accepting religious differences.”
Basically, Kiziltan is lying through his teeth here. The Ottoman Empire had a system of institutional repression of non-Islamic minorities, who were designated “dhimmis” and subjected to systematic humilitation and over-taxation, the most infamous of these being the boys stolen from their Christian families for the Janitsary army. But that’s history. The main reason that Turkey doesn’t have a problem with religious minorities is that they have largely been killed already, and whatever little remains of those cultures remain under strict formal and informal control. The informal control part includes the murders of prominent non-Muslim persons, latest the three barbaric murders in a Christian bookstore, with the purpose of “defending Islam.”
Until Turkey gets this right, with sincerity, the EU negotiations are quite pointless. And it doesn’t look too good these days.
Henrik Ræder Clausen,<br/>Denmark
