The problem of 46.638 Western Thrace “Denaturalized” Turks is also the problem of EU

Witten – 17.08.2005

The problem of 46.638 Western Thrace “Denaturalized” Turks is also the problem of European Union

Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) is about to give start to the project aiming to restore the rights of 46.638 Western Thrace Turks unconditionally who were denaturalized by the Greece Citizenship Law Article 19 which was repealled in 1998.

According to the official reply given to a notice of a question by Greece Ministry of Interior, Greece has denaturalized 46.638 Western Thrace Turks and Rodos Turks administratively with the following reasons as “not being from Heroic Race” and “leaving the country without any intention to come back”.

The 19th article of Greece Citizenship Law, which constituted the base of all these administrative implementations, was in force until 1998 as an apparently racist article in an EU country in spite of all international criticisms.

The article covers also the under age children whose eltern are denaturalized and many Western Thrace Turks who are in Germany for educational and vocational purposes are the victims of the law.
The article victimizes the Western Thrace Turks who even make their military service in Greece and these people lead a life without any social rights.

There has been no denaturalization since 1998 but however the rights of 46.638 victims, who have lost the Greece citizenships because of the mentioned article, can not be restored since the laws can not make any new regulations for the past implementations and also the denaturalization right of Greece government is protected by the constitution. The Greece governments have not been able to implement a serious policy for these victims up until now.


Judicial court is nonfunctional

Most of the victims learned that they had been denaturalized when they had either administrative problems in consolates or during ingress – egress at borders. When they faced the reality, the deadline was already over and because of this they could not run any counter – process aganist Greece unfair implementation. On the other hand, the only example that has resulted in positive was the court of Selahattin Galip but after a very short time, he had been denaturalized with the accusation of “so – called traitor”. It is almost impossible for the Western Thrace Turks who live out of Western Thrace to commence a suit due to the difficulty of prosecuting their claim as the financial difficulties make the process impossible for the Western Thrace Turks, who live in the region, while they can not get their pensions (although they had paid all the premiums) and also they can not engage in any economic activity as a result of being heimatlos.


It was used againist the Association officers

Engin Ahmet, member of ABTTF management board, learned that he had been denaturalized when he went to visit Western Thrace in1991 and during that period he was an officer at Western Thrace Turks Benefit Association in Homburg. He was neither able to go to Western Thrace nor commence a suit because of high cost until 1991, when he got German citizenship. He does not face any problems with his current EU citizenship when he goes to Western Thrace but he comments about the 10 year time during which he was heimatlos as; “I waited for a positive step from Greece for the victims of article 19 but there has not been any positive improvement up until now. We hope that Greece, our country, will abandon this unfair and wrong policy and give us back our citizenship which is title deed of our political and social rights in our country”.

ABTTF “Victims of Article 19” Project – Victim Data Bank

A small part of Western Thrace Turks, whose problems begin to become chronic, have been renaturalized but the recovery process are not in a form of restoration of the right but rather in a form of “for the first time – naturalization”. Any kind of recovery process is not valid for the “heimatlos” who are mostly concentrated in Turkey and Germany. With travelling abroad, they do not only lose their citizenships but also their social rights and sometimes possessions. They can not enter the land where they were born and grown up. ABTTF aims to present the situation of the victims of article 19, whose number has grown up with the family members born after denaturalization period and is much more than the formal figures, to the European Council and European Parliement with the help of the data bank. “It is beyond than being Greece’s internal problem” says Halit Habipoğlu, chairman of ABTTF and continues as “It is also European Union’s problem as well, this article has been applied since 1955 and with 1981, the year of Greece being EU member country, it has gained power and speed. For 17 years, EU has not taken any intervening act and the time to force Greece for a solution has come today. We aim to put the Western Thrace Turks’ denaturalization problem on the agenda of EU with our new activities”.