I would like to briefly use my right of reply to the statement by the Constantinopolitan Society.

The Greek Orthodox community living in Istanbul is among the non-muslim minorities recognised by the Lausanne Treaty of 1923. The members of the Greek Orthodox minority have the same rights and obligations as other Turkish citizens and they fully enjoy freedom of religion and right to worship at their 70 churches in Istanbul. Therefore the allegation that Turkey has violated her international commitments is not correct.

The allegation concerning a secret committee to discriminate against Greek minority or any other minority is also not correct.

As to right to education, today students belonging to the Greek minority continue their education at 17 primary, 5 secondary and 6 high schools in Istanbul.

The members of the Greek Orthodox minority also enjoy and practice all political rights as enshrined in the constitution. They are respected members of the Turkish society.

They publish their own newspapers, namely "Apoyevmatini" and "Iho", and have 65 foundations in Istanbul whose administrators are elected freely by the very members of the minority itself.

The Constantinopolitan Society also spoke about the Patriarchate. The Patriarchate is not ecumenical. In fact in the minutes of the Lausanne Treaty, the Patriarchate is mentioned as a Turkish institution dealing solely with religious matters of the Greek Orthodox minority living in Istanbul.

the matter of immovable property was also mentioned. According to our records there are 774 real estates registered in Istanbul in the name of Patriarchate. There are 216 additional ones whose ownership remain unregistered. We don/t know to whom they belong. There are 210 real estate belonging to real persons of Greek origin. Yes, there is a problem with some of the property. However, the speaker must be aware that this is an in-house conflict between the Greek community and the Patriarchate.

The speaker also spoke of the Theological School in Heybeliada. Since its founding, the republic, in order to maintain the secular character of the State, has positioned itself in an equidistant manner to all religious denominations and places of worship, the mosque, the church and the synagogue alike. In 1971 the constitutional Court ruled, and not in relation to the Theological School in Heybeliada, that religious education at University level could only be dispensed by public universities. This affected the Halki Seminary, as well as other religious schools.