AI refugee coordinator: We wish Turkey was as refugee-friendly as the Ottomans

According to Görendağ, the Ottoman policy toward refugees was very generous -- in many cases it opened its arms to those who were under the threat of persecution -- but Turkey is far from following the example set by the Ottoman Empire.

Asked during an exclusive interview with Today's Zaman what he would change if he were given the power to fix only one of the many problems refugees face, Görendağ answered “the mentality.”

“Of course at that time the definition of refugee had not yet been created, but anyone who is under the threat of persecution due to his identity was able to take shelter in the Ottoman Empire. It is very sad that this tradition was not maintained,” he says.

As a lobbyist for the rights of refugees and as a trainer working to raise social awareness on the subject, he said that in Turkey, there is a big confusion of concepts in this field not only in the related laws and regulations but also in the media and society.

“There were stories in the Turkish media about ‘illegal refugees.' Media, society and even officials are not aware of the differences between refugees, asylum seekers, irregular immigrants or victims of human trafficking,” he says.

According to him, if these concepts were known, the situation would be different because he believes Turkish society would not turn its back on people whose lives are being threatened.

He said a refugee is a person who, owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of their nationality and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail him/herself of the protection of that country, and a person who is seeking to be recognized as a refugee is an asylum seeker, but the one who is fleeing from his/her country due to economic conditions and arriving in other countries by illegal ways is an irregular immigrant.

“In Turkey, you see many stories in the media claiming that Turkey has become the center of refugees because they do not know the difference. There are even reports that during the last five years that more than 300,000 foreigners arrived in Turkey as ‘illegal refugees,' but the truth is that there are only 18,000 refugees and asylum seekers in this country, not more than this,” he explains, underlining that they are defending the rights of refugees and asylum seekers, not all who arrive in Turkey for any reason.

Is Turkey less powerful than Syria?

Görendağ underlines that 18,000 refugees and asylum seekers, compared to figures in Syria and Iran, is almost next to nothing.

“There are almost 1 million Iraqi refugees in Syria, and they are able cope with it. Iran has a similar situation. Even in Iraq, there are almost 10,000 refugees there coming from Turkey. A country like Iraq, which has been devastated by war, is able to cope with this. Is Turkey less powerful then these countries?” he asks.

He says that if he had the power to change anything about refugees and asylum seekers in Turkey, he would start by passing a law on asylum and migration.

“There is no law in Turkey in this field. There are only some articles in various laws regarding the issue as well as many regulations. This makes the situation even more complex,” he says.

When talking about the history of international regulations regarding refugees, Görendağ says he is saddened by the fact that Turkey was from the very beginning part of these debates but later chose to exclude itself from them.

“When the first international convention on refugees came on the agenda, Turkey was one of the countries which campaigned very hard for it from the beginning. It is one of the authors of the 1951 Refugee Convention. It addressed the topic of refugees because of events taking place in Europe. In 1967 geographical and temporal restrictions were removed, but Turkey kept them,” he says.

Görendağ says in the past some Western countries implemented quotas on the number of persons who sought refuge in Turkey but that this is disappearing now because other countries want to force Turkey to remove its geographical limitations.

“Let's say someone is coming from Iran and faces persecution. He applies to the UN here. The UN examines his situation and, if it finds out that this person fulfils the criteria of being a refugee, he is given the status of an asylum seeker. Then, since Turkey does not accept refugees from Eastern countries, the UN starts to look for a third country for them. There were some quotas for those kinds of people implemented by third countries, but now they are saying that ‘Turkey is claiming it is developed enough to be a member of the EU, necessitating a review of the refugee policy. Every day these quotas are lower and lower,” he complains.

Görendağ indicates that on average it takes three years for the UN to find a third country for refugees but that there are also people who wait for around 10 years before a third country accepts them in.

Additional definitions, additional problems

He adds that Turkey is still implementing geographical restrictions and accepting only Europeans as refugees but that it has also made its own additional definitions.

“For Turkey, if someone comes from Europe and fulfills the criteria of being a refugee, then this person is a refugee, and the one who applies for it is an asylum seeker. But if someone is coming from the East, then this person is defined as an ‘applicant for sanctuary.' These definitions are very important because they are the source of problems and rights.”

For those additional problems, Görendağ gives the example of health problems experienced by refugees.

“We were very happy to hear that the social security system will also cover these people. But we were in shock when we saw the law, which includes asylum seekers and stateless individuals. Asylum seekers, according to the Turkish definition, are people from Europe. Those coming from the East are called applicants for sanctuary,” he says.

“Before the law, at least in emergency cases, those people were able to apply to social welfare funds in cities and districts. But after the law, a circular warned local branches distributing these funds to not help these people if they encounter health problems because of the law,” he says.

Unaccompanied refugee minors

He underlines that a less problematic area for refugees and asylum seekers is national education since a recent circular issued by the Ministry of Education opens the way for asylum seeking children to attend school.

But according to him, this does not mean that refugee children are well protected.

“First of all, there are many unaccompanied refugee minors, especially from Afghanistan. Families there are able to collect money only for one person to send away and usually thinking that at least one of the children should try their chance,” Görendağ says.

He adds that despite international rules banning the deportation of unaccompanied minors under any circumstance, Turkey sometimes does that and that it takes Turkey some time to place these children in Social Services and Child Protection Agency (SHÇEK) orphanages.

He adds that a family wishing to enroll their child(ren) in school must have a residence permit, which is not easy to get.

International campaign for refugees in Turkey

Görendağ says a residence permit costs one person TL 612 annually, but when families are concerned, this sum can be much higher. He adds that there are no legal restrictions preventing a residence permit holder from getting a work permit, but adds that this is practically impossible.

“An employer must firmly state that it needs this particular employee and submit convincing reasons as to why this particular job cannot be done by a Turkish citizen.”

According to Görendağ, refugees must wait for a third country to accept them under these conditions but are not able to work legally, though they must pay TL 612 per person to acquire legal residence status.

“If they are unable to pay this amount, they must pay fines, and sometimes each year this amount gets larger and larger. If they do not pay, they are not allowed to leave the country even if a third country is willing to accept them,” he says.

He adds that this is why they are campaigning internationally for the removal of resident permit fees for asylum seekers.

Not guesthouses but detention centers

Görendağ, who describes his job as “to work, to get sad and to be happy for people in their absence” when he starts to talks about problems faced by asylum seekers, jumps from speaking about problems faced by one person to those faced by another because there are many of them.

He says another problem is places called “guesthouses,” which are in reality worse than detention centers.

He says regulations require that “foreigners” stay in places designated by the Ministry of the Interior. This is why guesthouses were established in three cities: İstanbul, Edirne and Kırklareli.

“Everyone, from irregular immigrants to asylum seekers and refugees -- and even foreign criminals -- is sent there. Living conditions are extremely bad,” he says.

According to Görendağ, these places are worse then detention centers because people are not allowed the leave. More importantly, it is not clear when they are to be allowed to leave. Sanitation is poor, and municipalities provide no food or other supplies. That said, not much can be done to change this.

“No one knows what rules these places are run by. A few poor policemen are in charge of everything. They cannot clean the places, so if the municipality is not sending food, they cannot find the means to feed the people there and they are also open to all kinds of disease, just as are people who have to stay there,” Görendağ says and adds that due to these problems, guesthouses are frequently scenes of violence.

He adds that even lawyers, NGO workers and sometimes United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) staff are not able to enter these places.

Görendağ notes that Turkey was recently ruled against by the European Court of Human Rights following a petition by two Iranian refugees. The court verdict termed the guesthouses detention centers.

“The European court found Turkey guilty for several reasons, one of which was preventing people staying in guesthouses from access to legal assistance. The decision was an exemplary case and we are hoping that this decision will put pressure on Turkey to review its policies pertaining to refugees,” he says.