First memorial service marks anniversary of Istanbul pogrom
by Daily Sabah with IHA
ISTANBULSep 07, 2015 - 12:00 am GMT+3
by Daily Sabah with IHA
Sep 07, 2015 12:00 am
A Greek Orthodox Church in Istanbul hosted the first religious memorial service for the victims of Istanbul pogrom on the 60th anniversary of violent riots.
Turkey's Greek and Armenian community attended the Divine Liturgy at Panayia Greek Orthodox Church in Yeniköy, a neighborhood in Istanbul's Sarıyer district, to mark the anniversary of two days of violence targeting non-Muslim minorities in 1955. The faithful, joined by church leaders and an opposition lawmaker of Armenian-Turkish origin, sang hymns and recited prayers.
Laki Vingas, head of the Panayia Greek Orthodox Church Foundation and a leading Greek community member, said in a speech that the pogrom was actually an attack on the citizenship of the Greek community who had been living in the city for centuries. "The ancient Greek community of Istanbul faced attacks targeting people, their properties, their sacred sites and hopes. They were driven out of their homeland," Vingas said. He added that the number of Greeks decreased but the community survives with the "interest and sensibility of younger generations" with regards to the past, and they were striving to reshape their future and institutions. Laki Vingas also remembered Turkish "friends and neighbors who helped the community and offered them shelter" during the pogrom. "We owe the survival of many houses and churches to their bravery and friendship," he added.
Selina Özuzun Doğan, a lawmaker from the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), said thousands of people who loved their homeland had to leave it after the pogrom. "As politicians, we should now focus on preventing a repeat of such incidents and heal past wounds," she said.
The pogrom was a culmination of tensions over the alleged bombing of the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Turkish Republic, which was in Greece's Thessaloniki at a time of soured relations with Greece over Cyprus, a Mediterranean island where Turkish and Greek residents were at odds over rumors of annexation of the island to Greece. Angry mobs had attacked shops and houses of Greek community members and looted them for two days.
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