BERLIN CONTACTS ANKARA OVER CONSUL CONTROVERSY

Earthtimes.prg
May 7 2009

Berlin – Berlin has spoken to Ankara about controversial reported
remarks by a Turkish consul, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Thursday
in Berlin, without disclosing what Germany asked for. There has been
outrage in Germany at reports that Consul General Hakan Kivanc, who
is based in Dusseldorf, claimed that Germans "would like to tattoo
the letter T" into the skins of immigrant Turks and "do the same to
them as was done to Jews under the Nazis."

Witnesses allege Kivanc made the remark at a private social event on
February 22. Kivanc denied making the remark and others like it.

"We are currently in contact with the Turkish side about it," the
German Foreign Ministry spokesman said. The conversation by telephone
took place between senior diplomats.

After two witnesses made sworn statements against Kivanc, centre-
right German political figures accused him of insulting Germans and
demanded Ankara remove him.

The allegations were not made public until the end of April by the Mor
Gabriel Initiative, a group representing people in Germany who belong
to the religious and ethnic minorities of Turkey, including Arameans,
Alawites, Armenians, Greeks and Kurds.

Ismail Coban, an artist who was among the six people who were dining
with Kivanc when the remarks were reportedly made, criticized the
publication of a private conversation as a breach of "our values."

He said Thursday the meeting had been a relaxed chat with drink and
food, where nobody had been writing down what was said.