Christian church may hold key to European Union

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DIYARBAKIR, Turkey -- When a mentally deranged Turk showed up at Diyarbakir Evangelical Church one hot July day quoting verses from the Koran and waving a butcher knife, it took police a half-hour to get there.

By that time, Medet Arslan, 27, had broken several windows, threatened the Christians who were inside the church, and burned New Testaments and other Christian literature, curtains, bookshelves, tapes, compact discs and whatever furniture he could find in the reception hall. Had church members not locked him inside the room, he might have gone to the sanctuary on the second floor to do more damage.

Known in Turkish as Diyarbakir Kilisesi, the 11-year-old congregation just inside the ancient white-and-gray basalt city walls is the only evangelical Christian group in all of eastern Turkey. The closest similar church is at Adana, in central Turkey near the southern coast. House prayer groups exist in the cities of Sanli Urfa and Gazi Antep, which are respectively two- and three-hour drives west of Diyarbakir.

However, this small congregation is playing a minor role in today's announcement in Brussels on whether talks can start regarding Turkey's admission to the European Union. Some governments -- among them those of Britain, Greece, Finland and Poland -- favor Turkey's admission to the union. Others, including Denmark and Austria, oppose it. Turkey's lackluster human rights record, especially regarding political prisoners, and slowness to allow religious freedom are two of the sticking points in the debate.

Istanbul, formerly Constantinople, was the capital of the Byzantine Empire and a center of Christianity centuries before the birth of Islam. Scattered Armenian, Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic and other churches, monasteries, cathedrals and pilgrimage sites of the early centuries of the Christian era remain in use as places of worship.

Sami Turgut, a diplomat at the Turkish Embassy, defended his country's actions.

"We have already made huge changes," he said, "and we are still making some changes in our laws and [penal] code."

Turkey's eagerness to be part of the European Union has dampened religious harassment aimed at evangelical Christians. In recent years, the national Committee of Culture and Protection of Historical Sites has filed two lawsuits to shut down the Diyarbakir evangelical Christian congregation.

Now the church is being watched by Europeans -- namely German, Dutch and British lawmakers, embassy officials and ambassadors who have visited -- to gauge whether Turkey is serious about human rights for religious and ethnic minorities. Minor matters, such as slow police response to an attack on the church, concern them.

Diyarbakir Kilisesi is made up of both Christians and Kurds, Turkey's main ethnic minority. Diyarbakir is in the heartland of a region known for its uprisings seeking self-rule for about 15 million Kurds packed into cities such as Diyarbakir, Van and Mardin.