Questions raised over deportation of Turk from north
THE DEPORTATION from the north of a Turkish man, sent packing in just his shorts, vest and sandals, is threatening to expose cracks in already strained relations between mainland Turkish immigrants and their Turkish Cypriot hosts.
Nazim Kara, a 42 year-old construction worker from Osmaniye in Turkey, was expelled from the island by ship last Thursday as he sought to extend his work permit in northern Nicosia. His wife and children remain in Cyprus.
Arriving in Ankara a day later, Kara claimed he had been a victim of anti-Turkish racism. The Turkish Cypriot authorities say he was deported after his citizenship to the north was revoked three months ago for what was described as “inappropriate behaviour”.
The ‘interior ministry’ was unavailable yesterday to explain the exact meaning of inappropriate behaviour.
Although deportations are a regular occurrence, Kara’s expulsion has touched a nerve in Turkey among those there keen to portray the north’s current administration as being anti-Turkish and overly pro-European.
Turkish establishment-backed daily Hurriyet ran the story on Monday, describing how Kara was approached by two policemen shortly after officials at the labour office in north Nicosia refused to stamp an updated work permit. He was handcuffed and later put on board a ferry at Kyrenia port bound for Turkey’s southern town of Tasucu.
On arrival in Tasucu, Kara, with only 22 Turkish Lira (around £7) in his pocket, boarded a bus to Ankara, where he presented himself at the Turkish Foreign Ministry seeking to lodge a complaint against the Turkish Cypriot authorities.
According the story Kara gave to Turkish media outlets, his deportation stemmed not from “official reasons”, but from ongoing run-ins with a neighbour, who Kara claims could have used political clout to have him removed from the island. He said the neighbour, a retired bank clerk, regularly complained about Kara’s children playing in the street in the walled city of Nicosia. The neighbour at one point, Kara said, openly threatened to have Kara, his wife and two daughters deported from the island.
But Kara complained that it was not only the retired bank clerk, but Turkish Cypriots in general, who harboured a dislike for mainland Turks.
A statement from the ‘interior ministry’ defended its actions, saying it had received a petition signed by 24 neighbours complaining of Kara’s behaviour. It also referred to police statements taken from his neighbours complaining about “disturbances”. The Turkish Embassy in Nicosia was said to have been informed about Kara’s impending deportation and had no objections to it being carried out.
The reason for the high-profile handling in the Turkish media of Kara’s plight remained unclear yesterday. A clue might, however, be found in a question asked in the Turkish parliament by an MP from the Motherland Party (ANAP), who queried whether the Turkish government would act to safeguard mainland Turks “suffering” in northern Cyprus. The current Turkish government regularly comes under fire from nationalist parties, as well as from the powerful military elite, who are unhappy with what they see as the government’s readiness to implement EU-inspired reforms that ultimately weaken the military’s hold on the state.
Mete Hatay, a Turkish Cypriot researcher who has carried out extensive studies into the demography and impact of Turkish settlement in north Cyprus, told the Cyprus Mail yesterday it was “too early to say” whether Kara’s case was being used to stir up animosity between the Turkish Cypriot and mainlander communities. He did say, however, that the lack of internationally-recognised norms in dealing with immigration in the north meant that abuse was widespread.
“You can exploit this situation either by letting anyone you want in, or by chucking anyone you don’t like out,” he said, adding that whatever Kara was accused of, deportation was not the right way of dealing with it.
