TURKISH COSMETICS COMPANY CHANGES FRENCH NAME IN PROTEST
By Yasin Kilic, Istanbul

Zaman, Turkey
Nov 7 2006

A Turkish cosmetics company, which has been using a French name for
24 years, has changed its name out of anger over France’s passing a
bill in parliament that would make it a punishable crime to deny an
Armenian genocide.

CEO of the Yildirimlar Group, Hasan Yildirim explained that the
Armenian bill was an attack on the history and values of the Turkish
republic and announced that they would no longer use the "Francois
Patrick" trademark for their cosmetic products.

The group will begin to use the "MW" name for its products from now on.

"We could have established a medium-scale cosmetics company with the
money we spent on changing our name," explained Yildirim.

"We were operating with the brand name ‘Francois Patrick’ in the
Turkish market but we couldn’t remain indifferent to the Armenian
bill passed in the French parliament. So, we decided to change our
name. We will market our new perfumes with the MW name within 10 days,"
clarified Yildirim.

Yildirim claimed that they made a courageous decision and noted that
they exchanged views with all their employees before doing so.

"This was a family decision," said Yildirim.