Russian Orthodox Patriarch Meets With Riga Mayor

In a meeting with the mayor of Riga, Nil Ushakov, Russian Orthodox Patriarch Cyril (Gundyayev) has called upon the Latvian government to recognize Russian as an official language of the Latvian state, noting that nearly half of the Latvian population speaks Russian as its first language and yet have been disenfranchised in the country as non-citizens despite their long residency in it. More here.

Clashes in Egyptian Village Force Flight of Resident Copts

Clashes in Dahshur, a village to the south of Cairo, have left one dead and sixteen wounded and resulted in the flight of the village's Coptic Orthodox residents. The fighting, which occurred this past week, resulted in the torching of multiple shops and homes owned by Dahshur's Copts. More here.

Turkish Mayor Protests Monolingualism

The mayor of a city in southeastern Turkey is protesting the Turkish government's hypocritical attacks on his efforts to provide government services not only in Turkish, spoken by a minority in the area, but also in Armenian, Assyrian, and Kurdish, which collectively are spoken by a large majority of the city's residents. More here.

Israel Considers Mandating Military Service for Israeli Arabs, Ultra-Orthodox Jews

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has announced that legislation under consideration to introduce universal conscription would mandate that Israel's Orthodox Jewish fundamentalists as well as its Arab citizens participate in military and national service. More here.

Turkish Imam Calls for Reopening of Halki

Imam Mehmet Gormez, head of the Turkish government's Religious Affairs Directorate, has publicly called on the Turkish government to allow the Halki Theological Seminary to reopen during his visit today to the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople. More here.

50,000 Christians Flee Syria?

In a repose to the Duma a Russian diplomat serving in Syria has estimated that 50,000 Christians have fled Syria or been killed during the course of the ongoing Syrian conflict. More here.

Turkish Constitutional Commission to Meet with Ecumenical Patriarch

The constitutional commission of the Turkish Parliament has invited Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew (Arhondonis) of Constantinople to speak to its members on 20 February about the issues facing the country's ethnic and religious minorities and how the new draft constitution being considered could best protect their place in Turkey. More (in Turkish) here.

Antiochian Orthodox Patriarch Comments on Syrian Unrest from Beirut

While on a pastoral visit to Lebanon the Antiochian Orthodox Church's Patriarch Ignatios IV (Hazim) has stated that he does not believe that Syria will collapse into civil war or that the efforts of its religious minorities to preserve their homeland's peace and stability are at the expense of either its freedom or its peoples' human rights. More here.

Turkish PM Declares an End to Ethnic Discrimination

At an iftar or Ramadan fast-breaking dinner hosted by the Turkish government for representatives of Turkey's religious minorities (none of whom, if the author is not mistaken, actually fast during Ramadan) Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stated in part that, "There have been times when people in our country were put under pressure for their beliefs, ethnic background, for the way they dress and their different lifestyles, but those days are over...nobody in this country is anymore privileged than anyone else in the eyes of the constitution or other laws."

Following the end of the iftar Patriarch Bartholomew (Arhondonis) of Constantinople, who participated in the event, welcomed the Turkish prime minister's statements as well as the recent decree of the Turkish government returning previously appropriated properties belonging to Turkey's religious minorities and expressed his hope that in the future Turkey would go further in its efforts to undo the injustices suffered by its minorities. More here.

Turkey to Return Religious Properties

In a decision announced Saturday the Turkish government has committed to returning the numerous churches, synagogues, cemeteries, and formerly church-run hospital, orphanage, and school buildings confiscated from Turkey's native religious and ethnic minorities since the foundation of the modern Turkish state following World War I. Properties already sold to private owners by the Turkish government are to be substituted for financial compensation from the state. The move comes as part of Turkey's ongoing efforts to qualify for membership in the European Union, which has long been concerned by the country's treatment of its non-Turkish citizens. More here.

US Commission Calls for Discussion of Safety of Iraqi Religious Minorities

In light of the recent bombing of a Syriac Catholic church in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk and the attempted bombings of two other churches the US Commission on International Religious Freedom has recommended that the US and Iraqi governments make the security of Iraq's religious minorities a topic of discussion in negotiations on the presence of US forces in Iraq after this year. More here.

Turkey's Syriac Orthodox Christians Fight for Right to Change Surnames

Turkey's Suryoyo minority is challenging the legality of the country's refusal to allow the Suryoyo to adopt their Syriac-language last names as their official surnames. The challenge comes despite a ruling earlier this year of Turkey's Constitutional Court that forbade a Suryoyo man to change his surname. Turkey's requirement that non-Turks bear Turkish-language surnames dates from a 1934 surname law forbidding the use of "foreign" surnames by Turkish citizens. More here.

Georgian Orthodox Church Concerned by Potential Return of Churches to Armenians

Despite calls from the Georgian Orthodox Church for calm, Georgia's large Armenian minority remains tense in the aftermath of this past weekend's large demonstrations against a law allowing the registration of the Armenian Orthodox Church in Georgia and four other minority religious organizations. While the head of the Armenian Orthodox Church in Georgia refused to comment on recent events, other representatives of Georgia's Armenian community who were interviewed said that most of the hysteria over the new law was whipped up by the hierarchy and clergy of the Georgian Orthodox Church, noting that of the six historic Armenian Orthodox churches in Tbilisi only two were still in use, whilst two others lay in ruins and two more had been appropriated by the Georgian Orthodox Church, which may now under the terms of the new law have to return them to the Church of Armenia. (In total there are more than 300 Armenian Orthodox churches in Georgia, of which only 40 are currently used by the Armenian Orthodox Church.) More here.

Lebanon Debates General Security Directorate

As the new Lebanese government in formation struggles to distribute its ministerial portfolios a debate has erupted in Lebanon over whether the government's directorate for general security should go to the country's Shiite Muslim minority, which has held it for the last decade; the Maronite Catholics, who have traditionally headed the directorate; or the Antiochian Orthodox, who despite being Lebanon's fourth largest religion have never held any security-related ministries. More here.

Georgian Orthodox Church Backs Down on Religious Minorities Law

The Georgian Orthodox Church has backed down from its strident, at times somewhat hysterical, opposition to a new law granting legal status to minority religious organizations in Georgia after a representative of the Georgian government informed a session of the Georgian Orthodox Holy Synod that the new law did not grant minority faiths equal standing with the Church of Georgia. More here.

Tbilisi Marches Protest New Legislation on Religious Organizations

Large protest marches took place over the weekend in Tbilisi, Georgia, to protest the Georgian government's enactment of legislation allowing the country's minority religious organizations to register with the state. The marches, the largest in recent years, were fueled by concerns that southeastern Georgia's Armenian minority will use the new legislation to gain equality with ethnic Georgians and by the Sunday sermon of Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II (Gudushauri-Shiolashvili) of the Georgian Orthodox Church, who said the new laws "humiliated the Church" and those behind them would "definitely be punished." More here and here.

Georgian Legislation Discussed by Saakashvili, Catholicos Karekin During June Visit

The Armenian Orthodox Church has welcomed the legislation of the Georgian government to allow the registration of Georgia's minority religious organizations, which was recently signed into law by President Mikheil Saakashvili. The groundwork for the legislation was apparently laid during the visit last month of Catholicos-Patriarch Karekin II (Nersessian) of Echmiadzin with the Georgian president. More here.

Georgian Opposition Joins Patriarchate in Calling for Repeal of Legislation on Religious Minorities

Georgian opposition parties are backing calls by the Georgian Orthodox Church to annul recent legislation granting legal status to five minority religious organizations present in Georgia, among them the Armenian Orthodox Church. Some opposition leaders have claimed the legislation, intended to protect the rights of Georgian citizens, inflame ethnic tensions, whilst others have begun calling for legislation that would grant the Georgian Orthodox Church official status as the country's state church. More here and here.

"Growth and Attendance in Orthodox Parishes in Canada"

An interesting survey of the state of the Orthodox Churches in Canada by Fr. Geoffrey Korz, rector of All Saints of North America Church in Hamilton, Ontario, has been posted here. Hat tip to Byzantine Texas for posting this first!

Georgian Parliament Passes Law Allowing Registration of Armenian Orthodox Diocese

The Georgian Parliament has finally passed a law to allow for the registration of Georgia's largest minority religious organizations, first among them the Armenian Orthodox Church's diocese in Georgia. Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II (Gudushauri-Shiolashvili) of the Georgian Orthodox Church opposed the new law, saying that national debates should be held to establish whether a majority of Georgians supported the measure. Georgian ultranationalists also opposed the law, saying that neighboring Armenia and Azerbaijan should be required to register the Georgian Orthodox Church in their countries first despite the miniscule size of their Georgian communities. More here and here.