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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: one_less who wrote (663753)	12/3/2004 11:21:28 AM
From: JDN	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

But, I thought it was a SUNNI Mosque that was attacked? jdn

To: one_less who wrote (663753)	12/3/2004 12:43:19 PM
From: goldworldnet	Respond to of 769670

Northern Cyprus espouses 'Islam lite' 'On paper they're Muslims ... but it's very weak' By Iason Athanasiadis dailystar.com.lb FAMAGUSTA, Northern Cyprus: The call to prayer is a rare reminder that it is a Muslim country. As it wafts around Nicosia's Turkish-occupied quarters, it often sounds like a plaintive appeal for believers from the mostly empty mosques. "On paper - in their passports or IDs - these people are Muslims," said Seymen Atasoy, a Turk who is the chairman of the department of international relations at Famagusta's Eastern Mediterranean University. "But Islam is very weak here." Rauf Denktash's internationally unrecognized state may be a Sunni majority on paper, but the scarcity of veiled women and an abundance of casinos, bars and cabarets sit strangely alongside the mosques, cemeteries and Islamic monuments. "This has evolved into a "Muslim lite" nation where the mosque and the Koran are peripheral," said a Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) official who declined to be identified. "Traditionally, they have looked to London and Paris for new ideas." Convoys of EU flag-waving youths snaked through Nicosia this week in impromptu demonstrations backing the reunification plan by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. The youths were a sign of the strong desire on the part of this generation of Turkish Cypriot twenty-somethings to make a break with the Turkish "motherland" and become European citizens. "It's the Greek side that is more religious traditionally," said Derek Hearl, a professor of European politics at Famagusta's Eastern Mediterranean University. "I call it the 'Mosque of England,'" in a reference to Britain's famously under-subscribed church. "They like to think it's there, but they don't go." The almost total lack of headscarves in a country that is nominally Sunni Muslim sits ill at ease with Arab or Western perceptions of Islam. It suggests a relaxed approach to religion that is culturally closer to the former, multicultural repositories of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans than Cairo, Amman or Riyadh. "Open displays of religiosity are frowned upon. This is a state where religion is a private affair," the TRNC official said. The TRNC's few international allies are almost exclusively Muslim countries including Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Azerbaijan and the UAE. Informal support for the TRNC may not have extended to recognition but Denktash's statelet was awarded observer status at the Organization of the Islamic Conference summit meeting in 2000. The TRNC has asked that its status be upgraded to full membership in time for the next meeting, in Istanbul. Still, close ties with Muslim countries have not influenced the relaxed, Mediterranean lifestyle of Northern Cyprus' Muslims. Turkish Cypriots generally abstain from consuming alcohol only during Ramadan and laughingly tell stories about the island's mufti sitting through official lunches where whiskey was consumed openly. "This is the only Muslim area in the world which is genuinely secular and where Islam is an individual affair," said Ishtiaq Ahmad, a Pakistani professor of international relations at one of Northern Cyprus' five universities. "In the debate of Islam versus the West, this is an ideal place. If the TRNC enters Europe, it will be an ideal depiction of what Islam could achieve." Young Turkish Cypriots believe they are closer in their customs and traditions to their Christian Greek Cypriot neighbors than the more religious immigrants from Turkey's Anatolia Province who have settled Northern Cyprus since 1974. "We are very similar in our eating, drinking and lifestyle," said Taniel Guvensol, a student at Eastern Mediterranean University who is in her early 20s. "Some people - especially on the Greek side - are using religion to cause trouble." The Greek Orthodox Church in Cyprus has traditionally been deeply politicized, especially since the 1950s and 1960s when Archbishop Makarios led the campaign for Enosis (union with Greece) and was elected three times to be president of the Republic of Cyprus. The church has continued to be the engine for nationalism and has taken a clear stance against the Annan plan. Most recently, Bishop Pavlos of Kyrenia warned that those who vote yes "will lose their homeland and the kingdom of heaven." Such religious incursions into politics remain unheard of in the North where the secular Turkish state holds sway. "Turkey is a secular state but not a secular society," said Hearl. "This is truly a secular society, to the extent that younger people often don't even know what's in the Koran." While settlers from mainland Turkey are more religious, the TRNC has held a rigidly worldly stance. Children do not receive religious education in schools, and there is no option of taking classes in Islamic studies on any of the island's universities. The North's most fervent Muslims are said to be Arab students from the nearby Middle East. "Maybe it's the result of British colonialism or of having lived together with the Greeks," said Atasoy. "Islam is very weak here." The religious chasm between religious settlers and secular Turkish Cypriots was on display on Thursday night at simultaneous yes and no demonstrations. While the no vote rally was awash with Turkish flags and headscarved women, there was hardly a hijab to be seen at a 20,000 strong pro-Annan plan gathering in Turkish Nicosia's Ataturk Square. Instead, a majority mid-20s crowd dressed in the latest fashions waved EU flags, danced and sang along with the band on stage. "This could be a study for Muslims countries hoping to enter the EU in the future," said Atasoy. "It could be said that, if the Turkish Cypriots managed it, then maybe Turkey can, too." * * *