Dear friends,
As the Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF), we have brought our activities to Brussels, Strasbourg, Vienna, Warsaw, Geneva and now to Athens.
We opened our Athens office a year ago to be more active in Athens and to have a dialogue with the government and the Athens circles.
With the opening of our Athens office, we follow the agenda in our country even more closely, we immediately determine our position and show our reaction when there is any development concerning our community in politics and media.
It is understood that some circles are so disturbed by the work we have started more actively in Athens at the levels of government, politics, media and civil society that they have started a campaign to smear ABTTF.
Those who are acting with the logic of ‘throw dirt enough, and some will stick’, are issuing unfounded allegations and accusations against us and trying to undermine our effort, as the Turkish community in Western Thrace, to create a dialogue with the rulers of our country in Athens.
We saw the latest example of this situation when MP Evripidis Stylianidis from our region gave an interview to the Militaire website on 27 February 2021 where he spoke about ABTTF.
Stilyanidis accused us of being an association that deliberately operates in Germany and made the accusation that if we were headquartered in Greece, our way of address and actions would have come directly in conflict with the Greek Constitution and the laws.
That’s not all!
Stylianidis alleged that we as ABTTF are deliberately dealing with him personally.
What next!
In face of the strong accusations during the interview of Stylianidis towards ABTTF, obviously we could not stay quiet.
First, in a press release, with the aim of breaking the image and perception that was meant to be created about us, we announced to the public that that the allegations and accusations formulated by Stylianidis were not true.
Later, we sent a warning letter to Stylianidis and three press and media organisations which had published his interview, responding to the allegations and accusations and asking them to remove the statements of Stylianidis which have damaged ABTTF’s reputation and image.
At this point, I would like to point out that as ABTTF, we fully respect press freedom, but we could not be unresponsive to the statements of Stylianidis, who had made offensive, outrageous and unfounded claims about us.
Indeed, we know that the purpose of this mentality is to make ABTTF look like a pawn of others with a different and hidden agenda to the public of our country, national and international civil society organisations.
But they will not succeed!
Because ABTTF is an organisation that is taken seriously by international institutions and organisations and even referenced in international reports!
No matter what anyone says, we will continue to strive to make the voice of our community heard in even wider circles, and we will work even harder for it.
Stay healthy.
Halit Habip Oğlu
ABTTF President
