The Protestant Churches Association published the “2022 Human Rights Violations Monitoring Report”. In the 12-page report on the situation of the Protestant community in Turkey, many long-standing issues are addressed under headings.
Since 2007, a report on the situation of the Protestant community in Turkey has been prepared, but this year it was delayed due to the earthquake disaster.
The published report summarizes the following points.
Freedom of religion and belief is secured under both national and international laws and the constitutional authority in our country as one of the basic rights found in national and international laws, as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Generally, there is freedom of religion in our country but despite legal protections, there were still some basic problems that continued for the Protestant community in 2022. With the aim of contributing to the development of freedom of belief in Turkey, this report has been prepared to present some of the experiences, problems as well as positive developments that have been experienced in 2022 by the Protestant community relating to religious freedom.
The situation in 2022 is summarized below:
Microsoft Word – 2022 Violations report 22.docx
- Because of the isolation in 2021 due to the pandemic, there were no physical attacks against Protestant Christians, either individuals or institutions, because of hate of their faith; in 2022 these attacks began to occur again.
- In 2022, hate against Protestant Christians, based on hatred of beliefs of individuals or institutions, expressed verbally or in writing, along with hate speech which pro- vokes hate in the public increased from the previous year.
- In 2022, problems continued to be faced regarding requests to establish a sole place of wor- ship, to continue using a facility for worship, or with applications to use existing church buildings.
- In 2022, the trend for churches to gain legal status through the establishment of a religious foundation continued to strengthen.
- There was no progress regarding the rights of Christians to train their own religious workers. Many foreign church leaders were deported, were denied entry into Turkey, or faced prob- lems with getting their residence permits renewed. The increase in foreign currency rates made it difficult to send students to foreign theological schools.
- In 2022 there was an increase in hate speech compared to the previous year.
