{"id":52700,"date":"2012-04-14T15:04:25","date_gmt":"2012-04-14T12:04:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?p=52700"},"modified":"2014-01-07T14:21:12","modified_gmt":"2014-01-07T12:21:12","slug":"six-historic-graveyards-returned-to-istanbuls-jewish-greek-and-armenian-communities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2012\/04\/14\/six-historic-graveyards-returned-to-istanbuls-jewish-greek-and-armenian-communities\/","title":{"rendered":"Six Historic Graveyards Returned to \u0130stanbul\u2019s Jewish, Greek and Armenian communities"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Six historic graveyards were returned to \u0130stanbul\u2019s Jewish, Greek and Armenian communities on Thursday, following a decision by a government board that regulates the practices of the country\u2019s non-Muslim communities.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-52703\" title=\"Beyoglu\" src=\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/Beyoglu.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"307\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/Beyoglu.jpeg 307w, https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/Beyoglu-300x293.jpeg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 307px) 100vw, 307px\" \/>The decision of the Directorate General for Foundations (VGM) to restore the cemeteries to their respective minority communities is the first ruling on a February application by 19 non-Muslim foundations for the return of 57 historic properties.<\/p>\n<p>In September, the government authorized the return of properties seized from non-Muslim religious communities in decades past.<\/p>\n<p>Thursday\u2019s VGM ruling saw the return of two cemeteries to the Beyo\u011flu Y\u00fcksek Kald\u0131r\u0131m Ashkenazi Jewish Synagogue Foundation, as well as the repatriation of cemeteries belonging to the Beyo\u011flu Greek Orthodox Churches and Schools Foundation, the Balat Surp Hre\u015ftegabet Armenian Church and School Foundation, the Kad\u0131k\u00f6y Hemdat Israel Synagogue Foundation and the Kuzguncuk Beit Yaakov Ashkenazi Synagogue Foundation.<\/p>\n<p>Laki Vingas, the representative of non-Muslim foundations at the VGM, told the Radikal Daily on Thursday that the decision is a sign that the minority property law passed in September is being acted upon by the government. This week, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the US Congress that she was encouraged by the \u201cconcrete steps Turkey has taken over the past year to return properties to religious communities.\u201d Turkey\u2019s mostly Muslim population of nearly 75 million includes roughly 65,000 Armenian Orthodox Christians, 20,000 Jews, 15,000 Assyrians and about 3,500 Greek Orthodox Christians. While Armenian groups have 52 foundations and Jewish groups 17, Greeks have 75. Some of the properties that were seized from those foundations include schools and cemeteries.<\/p>\n<p>(source: worldbulletin)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Six historic graveyards were returned to \u0130stanbul\u2019s Jewish, Greek and Armenian communities on Thursday, following a decision by a government board that regulates the practices of the country\u2019s non-Muslim communities. The decision of the Directorate General for Foundations (VGM) to restore the cemeteries to their respective minority communities is the first ruling on a February [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":52703,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2939],"tags":[6783],"class_list":["post-52700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultureart","tag-properties-of-minorities"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52700\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}