Omer Celik, minister of culture of Turkey's Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, has made repeated calls recently in which he invited non-Muslims to come back to Turkey. In his most recent TV interview on March 29, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan himself repeated this call and he said their government is calling non-Muslims back to Turkey. Do these calls have any potential to create a mass return of non-Muslims to Turkey? Has Turkey made profound changes in the way it handles its non-Muslim citizens?
I do not think that these questions have simple yes-or-no answers. Before I try to give my own answers, I have to give little bit background to illustrate to what extent Turkey’s non-Muslim policies have changed.